For the Alliance
by wolf730
Summary: Following their rescue mission, Team Voltron is scattered to the ends of the Universe. Pidge, the Green Paladin, finds herself in a far off system. Here she meets a race who might be just what the Voltron Alliance needs to finally defeat Zarkon. The only problem, if she wants their help she has to navigate a dangerously corrupt and biased political system. Luckily she's not alone.
1. Chapter 1

A/N Hello every body, just wanted to let any new readers now that I started writing this Fic immediately after I finished watching Season 1, so I had no idea what was going to happen and therefore created by went off what I thought. Basically what I'm saying is that this is an AU Fic so a lot of things won't fit perfectly into canon. So, if that upsets you, don't read, if you're okay with that then I hope you enjoy.

Deep space, millions of miles from the closest planet, a lone starship floats through the darkness. Its sheer size dwarfs the numerous hunks of debris scattered throughout the void. As it went various lights positioned along the hull where casting an eerie blue glow across the vessel's jet black surface. The only place not covered by this glow was the ship's bridge located amidships. On said bridge, a single man stood atop an elevated platform. His position granted him an unobstructed view of the various command stations surrounding him. The man perfectly matched the ship he commanded. He was dressed in black armor the same shade as the ship itself. Four bars of blue light adorned his chest, yet another aspect of his garb that mimicked the look of his vessel. This, combined with his stern expression, gave the impression that he was actually a part of his vessel, almost as if they'd been made for each other. Suddenly, a voice shattered the silence.

"Shipmaster, the sensors have picked up an unidentified object directly off the starboard bow. Roughly thirty standard measurements away, floating among the debris. It appears to be some kind of vessel, but I'm not sure."

The Shipmaster answered, his expression still locked on the viewport in front of him. "Aye, Helmsmen Vex. Lieutenant Zek, lock all sensors on that object, I want to know what that thing is."

"Aye Shipmaster." he responded, taking a few moments to type away at the screen in front of him before continuing. "I can't seem to get an accurate reading. The debris field appears to be interfering with the sensors. I am picking up a faint electrical signal, which means it's probably a vessel of some kind. We'd have to get closer if you want a more precise reading."

"Aye Lieutenant. Helmsmen, take us closer to the Debris field. Zek, as soon as we're in range, I want a full tactile analysis on that object."

"Aye Shipmaster." His two subordinates answered simultaneously. Immediately the hulking vessel began to change direction before continuing along its new heading. A few moments later Zek's console lit up in a vibrant display of colors and shapes.

"Shipmaster, I've completed the analysis. We now have a full tactile read-out on the object."

"Good work Lieutenant, transfer the feed to my command station." The Shipmaster ordered.

Within seconds the young officer was surrounded by a number of holographic screens each one displaying various charts and informational readouts.

After reviewing them for a few minutes he began to think to himself.

Well, it's defiantly a ship. Unknown classification, that's odd. Whatever it is, its small, defiantly not a capital ship. One life from aboard, probably the pilot. I wonder if they're still alive in there? It's defiantly be damaged. At least the life-support's still operational, that's a good sign. It's defiantly not a Galra ship, energy signature's all wrong. I know I've seen a signature like this before, but I can't quite place it.

"Lieutenant, cross reference these readings with all Lincar historical records."

"Aye Shipmaster... The records indicate these readings most closely resemble technology originating from... Altea."

The Shipmaster froze as soon as he heard that name, his stern expression replaced by one of stunned confusion.

He began to softly mutter to himself. "Alteans, it can't be that's impossible. Unless..." He paused for a second before speaking, his previous expression slowly returning.

"Lieutenant Tar," he shouted. "ready the tractor beam. Ensign Caz, have a flight crew prep the main hanger bay. I want that ship brought aboard and secured now. Helmsmen Vex, as soon as we've secured that vessel take us to the edge of the system as quick as you can. I want to put as much space between us and the Galra Empire as possible. No matter what happens, we cannot let them get their hands on this ship."

"But Shipmaster," the lieutenant asked, his voice shaking ever so slightly. His words were filled with an odd mix of fear and anticipation. "our mission is to patrol the border."

"Our mission has changed. If that's what I think it is out there we cannot let it fall into Galra hands. Commander Shrike, I want you to assemble a medical team and have them sent to the hanger."

"Aye Shipmaster, but if you don't mind me asking, what do you think this is?" Vex asked. His expression slowly twisting into one of worried confusion.

The Shipmaster paused before finishing. The anticipation of what he was about to say was almost tangible. It was as if the whole bridge was collectively holding its breath. Until finally, he spoke. "If I'm right we've just stumbled upon the signal most powerful weapon in the entire galaxy. The key to defeating the Galra Empire, the defender of the Universe... Voltron."

...

A bright flash of light and then, darkness. That's the last thing Pidge remember. They were escaping, something had gone wrong and then, nothing. Suddenly the darkness disappeared and she found herself sitting up in a large bed screaming bloody murder. Beads of cold sweat slowly dripped down her face and onto the luxurious bedspread she currently found herself wrapped up in. She quickly wiped the haze from her eyes before frantically scanning her surrounds. She desperately searched for any sign of the familiar until, finally, something caught her eye. There was a small table next to the bed, and there, lying on the polished black marble tabletop was her Bayard. In one swift motion, she leaped from the bed, snatched her weapon and ignited the blade as she landed beside the bed. She stood there for a few moments taking in her surroundings. That's when she realized, she had absolutely no idea where she was.

She currently found herself standing near the rear of a large room with steel gray walls. Oddly enough, the chamber itself was practically empty. Besides the two items she'd already seen, the only furnishing was a desk placed up against the left wall. For some reason, there was a metal bar attached to the wall opposite the desk. A metal sliding door, one of two in the room, was located just to the right of the bar. The other door was position in the middle of the wall opposite the bed.

"Where the quiznak am I?" she muttered.

"I don't think you're using that word correctly."

Startled, the young paladin spun on her heels, pressing the blade of her weapon against the neck of the stranger before her. She stood there for a few moments, sizing up her opponent. He was about a foot taller than she was, with broad shoulders. His frame actually reminded her of Shiro. It was clear whatever species he was she'd never met one before. He lacked the purple skin of a Garla, the odd facial markings of an Altean, or the absurd physical figures of the countless Galra slaves she and her friends had freed. Instead, his skin was the color of amber covered in dozens of tiny scars. He did share some characteristics with her Altean friends, his ears were pointed much like Allura's, only his were longer and more triangular. His hair was also the same shade as her friend's, of course, his haircut was different, very different. His hair had been cut into a short Mohawk, maybe half an inch tall, that ended just before the back of his head. Besides this, he was completely bald. Truly his most striking feature was his eyes. They reminded her of wolf eyes, cold and calculating. This combined with their color, an intense icy blue, made it seem as if he physically froze whatever he looked at. Suddenly the stranger spoke, breaking her concentration.

"You've been staring at me for quite a while now, are you okay?"

"Wha…" she began only to be immediately interrupted.

"It's not that I mind the attention, it's just I'm not the biggest fan of having a blade held to my throat. If you don't mind, would you please remove it?" his voice was quite calm all things considered, and this actually surprised Pidge. She hadn't really expected him to react that way. Of course, that might have been because he was a member of an alien race. For all, she knew situations like this could happen daily here. Hell, it might even be an integral part of his culture.

"Give me one good reason why I should." She said gathering all the fake confidence she could muster and funneling it into her words.

"Well, the truth is, I don't really feel like dying today."

"Is that the best you got?" She asked, a smirk plastered on her face.

"No, I also have a pistol aimed at her spine, but I felt like the first reason was more polite." Pidge's smirk disappeared the instant the stranger finished.

He had to be lying, she thought to herself.

She quickly glanced down at her stomach, low and behold, there it was. The barrel of some strange blaster pistol was about an inch from her stomach.

"How about this?" the stranger began. "On the count of three, we both lower our weapons."

"Three ticks or three seconds?"

"What's a second?" he asked, clearly confused

"Ticks it is then."

"Three, two, one, now." With that, the two warriors lowered their weapons and slowly stepped away. And there they stood, staring each other down until finally, the Shipmaster broke the silence.

"I see you found your weapon, it is a unique piece of engineering."

Pidge remained silent.

"I had a few of my engineers take a look at it. Not a single one could figure out how it worked. Same way with your ship. Speaking of your ship, I need your help with a situation in the hanger bay."

Pidge remained silent.

"Are you actually going to say something, or are you just going to stand there and try to glare me to death?"

Begrudgingly, Pidge finally decided to speak. "Why should I talk to you?" There was anger in every word.

"Because you're just as curious about me as I am about you. I can see it in your eyes. If I wasn't standing here, you would have already searched this place top to bottom. Am I right?" he said cocking his eyebrow. Pidge blushed slightly, he was right. Even now her head was filling with questions, of course, one kept showing up over and over again.

"Why were you watching me sleep?" she yelled, internally debating whether or not to attack him. If he didn't know how her Bayard worked then he didn't know it could fire a grappling hook. She decided against it, though.

"I wasn't really watching you sleep. I only came in a few Ticks ago, my lancers said you were starting to stir. I thought you might be about to wake up, and I wanted to be there when you did."

"Why?"

"I have a few matters I'd like to discuss with you, and I'd prefer if we discussed them in private. That's why I had them bring you to my quarters after they took you out of the healing pod."

"Yeah, cause that's not creepy as hell. It's not bad enough I wake up on some random ship, but it turns out the captain has some creepy obsession with me." She said, her glare intensifying.

"Don't get the wrong impression, my interest in you is purely professional. You see, all the historical records I've ever read say that Voltron was one of the most powerful weapons ever created. Five lions that could join together to create a ship so devastating, it could wipe out whole fleets. They also say that Voltron was destroyed at the end of the Great War, ten thousand years ago. So, imagine my surprise when my crew and I stumble across one of these mythical lions, floating at the edge of Galra space. The way I see it, there are two possibilities. You're either a Galra spy, or you really are one of the legendary Voltron Paladins. Personally, I think you're a Paladin, but I have a duty to protect my crew. So, I have to be absolutely sure of your identity before I let you go anywhere on my ship." His tone shifted towards the end there. It ceased being calm and collected. Instead, it was intense and threatening, but not angry. More like dangerous. It actually scared Pidge a little, not that she let it show.

"So" he continued. "Seeing as how both have questions that need answering I suppose a trade. You ask a question; I give you an answer. I ask you a question; you give me an answer. Deal?"

She hesitated for a second. It seemed like a fair deal, but she wasn't sure. She couldn't quite figure out how she was supposed to feel about this stranger. Her first instinct was not to trust him, but for some reason, he gave off this weird fraternal vibe. Maybe it was because he shared a passing resemblance to her friend Shiro. Or maybe it was because she'd more than likely suffered some form of head injury. Whatever the reason, she agreed to his arrangement.

"Seeing as you're the guest here, why don't you ask the first question?"

"Okay then. Why don't we start with, who are you?!"

"A fair question." The stranger began. Gently he brought his hand to his chest and slowly lowered his head. "My name is Captain Sun Vac, Shipmaster of the Corsair and loyal servant of Queen Najera, Monarch of the glorious Kingdom of Lincar. I would like to officially welcome you to my ship."

Okay, Pidge thought to herself. That answered absolutely nothing. Who the heck is Queen Najera, what the heck is a Shipmaster? Well, I guess it must be some equivalent of a captain. But he also called himself captain. Maybe captain's a rank and shipmaster just means he commands the ship or vice versa. I guess it doesn't really matter much.

"So now you know who I am but I don't know who you are?" Sun asked cheerfully.

"My name is Katie, Katie Holte. My friends call me Pidge, and for your information, I am a Voltron Paladin." For some reason, Sun didn't look too convinced. She couldn't decide whether or not to take this personally.

"So, Sun Vac, where are my friends? What happened to them?"

"Excuse me?" Sun replied clearly confused.

"My friends, the other Paladins. We were together, where are they?"

"I'm afraid I have no idea what you're talking about. Yours was the only ship we found out here and there was no sign of anyone else in the area, and believe me, we checked. No ships, no life forms, nothing but debris, and even that was nothing more than chunks of rock and ice. If your friends survived whatever engagement damaged your ship, they're not here."

"Where even is here? You said you found me on the edge of Galra space, but the last thing I remember is attacking Zarkon's Command System..."

"You attacked Zarkon's Command System?!" he asked, clearly shocked. "You're telling me you and your friends attacked the heart of the Galra empire?"

"Yeah, so?"

"Are you insane? No wonder you and your friends lost, that place is impenetrable. What could possibly compel you to attack that place?"

"We didn't have much of a choice, our leader, Princess Allura, was captured and we needed to save her."

"Wait, you'll telling me you've met Princess Allura...the Princess Allura? How old are you?"

Something about the way he said that seemed to aggravate her.

"Why?"

"Princess Allura died ten thousand years ago along with the rest of the Altean race. For you to have known her when she was alive, you'd have to be at least…."

"She's not dead!" Pidge yelled cutting him off "She's alive and so is Voltron. And step by step we're taking the Universe back from Zarkon and his goons."

"Heh, so Zarkon's not the only one who's survived since the Great War. Interesting." Sun said, a small smirk forming on his face. That's when Pidge realized maybe it wasn't such a good idea to go around shouting all their military secrets. But wait, why didn't he already know this? How far away was she from her last position? And where was everyone else? This whole experience seemed to yield more questions than answers. For example, where the quiznak was her armor! For some reason, she was wearing a weird nightgown, smock thing.

"What happened to my armor?!"

"Actually, I believe it's my turn to ask you a question."

"No, not until you tell me what happened to my armor! And why I'm wearing this... thing?!"

"It's a medical smock. It's the only thing we had that would fit someone of your... stature. We had to remove your armor to place you in the healing unit. If you want, I can have it brought here." He then brought his hand to a collar he wore around his neck that lit up when he touched it. "Commander Shrike, have our guest's armor brought to my quarters." He then lowered his hand and turned his attention back to Pidge. "So would you mind if I ask my question now?"

"Go ahead." She answered still pretty upset.

"You're not Altean, and your defiantly not a Galra. So what are you?"

"How do you know I'm not Altean, our race is known for its shapeshifting properties." She bluffed. If she could keep any more aliens from finding out about earth and mankind, she would.

"Lincar records show Alteans could only change their physical appearance, not their biology. I had my medical technicians run a number tests on you once you were brought aboard. None of them matched records of Altean biology. That, and your ears are a dead giveaway."

"Crap" Pidge muttered to herself. Her ruse derailed she decided there was only one thing left to do, tell the truth. "I'm a human being, we hail from the planet Earth. It's a peaceful planet, it doesn't even know about Zarkon or the Galra empire."

"No wonder I've never seen anything like you before. Earth's way out in the middle of nowhere. I think Zarkon technically has a claim to that part of the universe, but its way out there on the fringes."

"Wait, how does everyone know about Earth?"

"Well, the Lincar learned about most of that end of the universe from the Galra and I believe they learned about it from the Alteans."

"Wait, your friends with the Galra!?"

"The Galra Empire and the Kingdom of Lincar are far from friends. I've lost count of the number of times we've gone to war. At the moment we're technically at peace, but skirmishes still happen constantly. It's one of the reasons I decided to pick you up. If Voltrons back, we might finally be able to defeat the Galra."

"Wait you're telling me you guys…"

Suddenly, Pidge was cut off as Sun's collar began to blink and beep wildly. Then it began to broadcast a women's voice, it sounded like she was panicking.

"Shipmaster Vac we have a problem! You're needed on the bridge immediately!"

"Commander Shrike, what's happening?" he asked as he made his way to the room's exit.

"We have two ships attempting intercept course. Galra Destroyers, escort class. They're gaining on us and fast. Should we try to outrun them?"

"Negative, they're too fast we'll never outrun them. Our only option is to try and fight them off. Sound the alarm, have all crew members report to battle stations immediately. Have lieutenants Zek and Tar ready all weapons."

"Aye, Shipmaster. I'll see you on the bridge, Shirke out."

"Sun, I can help, bring me to my lion."

"No. You're not ready to fly, besides, the Lions not ready to launch," Sun replied, his face and tone were far more serious than they were just a moment before. It matched the way he'd acted earlier. Back when he began to speak to Pidge. He was even giving off the same aura of danger and calm intensity. All Pidge could do was nod in agreement and watch him leave.

...

A chorus of voices and mechanical sounds echoed off the walls of the bridge as the staff went about their business preparing for the battle to come. Shipmaster Vac was standing atop his platform, Shrike positioned next to him, her white armor clashed harshly with his own. They both stood there stone-faced, eyes locked dead ahead.

"Shipmaster, Galra ships closing fast. At this rate, they'll overtake us in 300 ticks." Zek said, his eyes glued to his screen.

"Aye, Lieutenant. Helmsman Vex, increase speed by thirty marks. Head straight for that moon."

"But Shipmaster," Shrike began skeptically. "You said we couldn't out run them. We should bring the ship about and face them head on. We have the advantage in size and fire power…"

"Yes Commander," Sun interrupted, to the clear aggravation of his second. "but they're faster and more maneuverable than we are. The first rule of warfare, never underestimate the advantage agility can give you in a fight Commander. Trust me, I know." his voice was stern, almost scholarly. "Lieutenant Tar, ready four proton charges and prime the ion Canon. Helmsman, increase speed and prepare to enter the moon's orbit."

"Aye Shipmaster. But if I may sir, I thought we weren't running."

"We're not. Like I said there's no way we could outrun them."

"Then what are we doing?" Shrike asked her voice void of the respect with which Vex spoke. "We're not running, yet we continue to increase speed. We're not turning to fight yet we're charging the ion canon. And now we're priming proton charges. Will someone please tell me what we're actually doing?!"

"Commander, may I remind you that I do not have to justify myself to you or anyone else on this ship. Lieutenant Zek, how far away are those hostiles."

"They've spread out slightly. First ones about twenty standard units to stern, the seconds five units behind that."

"Shipmaster." Vex cried out. "We're about to enter the moon's gravitational pull."

"Good, Helmsman, slingshot us around the moon. Tar switch ion canon to manual firing procedure. I want you to fire on my command and not a tick sooner."

"Aye Shipmaster, but we don't have a firing solution."

"We won't need one."

What happened next could only be described as spectacular. The Corsair entered orbit around the moon, using its gravity to slingshot around the planetoid. There it came face to face with the two Galra vessels. The lead vessel was just beginning to enter the moon's orbit while the second was entirely in the open. The Corsair's bow was aimed directly at the midsection of the rear vessel.

"Fire!" Sun yelled, his voice shattering the suspenseful silence of the bridge.

A neon blue beam went shooting out of her ion cannon racing straight for the smaller vessel. As soon as the beam made contact with the enemy ship it violently burned its way through the hull. A moment later a massive fireball erupted from within the ship only to be extinguished instantly by the cold void of space. Once the beam dissipated all that was left was the ship, now mangled by the impact. The damage was so extensive that the ship itself was nearly split in two, a few strands of charred and twisted metal being the only thing keeping it together. While this was going on the second ship was making its way around the moon following in the path of the Corsair. Soon, it found itself on the opposite side of the moon as its intended target. In a desperate attempt to catch up its prey, the smaller vessel violently accelerated. Its crew was so single-minded in their pursuit that they failed to notice the cluster of metallic spheres floating just above their bow. Suddenly, the bow of the ship was engulfed in blue flame as a shockwave rippled through space. The force of the explosion was so great that huge plumes of dust were kicked up on the moon's surface. When the dust and debris cleared the horror of what happened was finally revealed. The hull itself had buckled, causing the ship to nearly bend in half. Worse still, the vessels rear section was twisted at an unnatural angle. It looked as if a giant set of hands had literally bent the ship in half before violently twisting it. It was all over, the whole engagement had only taken ten minutes. In that time, two ships had been reduced to little more than mangled husks barely recognizable as anything but hulks of twisted metal. With its work done the Corsair, broke orbit leaving the remains of its victims trapped in the moon's gravitational field. Their fallen crews condemned to forever orbit a barren moon in a forgotten system far from anything they would consider even remotely familiar. A horrid fate perfectly mirrored by the condition of their demolished vessels. Unfortunately, sympathy for their vanquished foes was all but absent from the Corsair. Instead, the crew was cheering in celebration of their victory. Nowhere was this celebration greater than on the ship's bridge. Their people cheered each one, shouting the praises of their young Shipmaster. Oddly it seemed the only person who wasn't cheering was Sun himself. He simply stood there, his only sign of joy being a small smile. Standing right next to him was his first mate Commander Shrike. A look stunned amazement plastered on her face.

"Where did you learn to do that?" She asked as she ran her fingers through her own Raven hair. A nervous habit of hers. One that always seemed to rear its ugly head every time she was at a loss for words.

"Back during the war." Sun began "A Galra Commander once used that trick to fool me and another Shipmaster. Luckily I realized what happened before it was too late. Unfortunately, Garter and his crew weren't so lucky. Apparently, the Galra don't learn from the mistakes of others. That's rather foolish of them, don't you agree, Commander?" With that, he turned on his heels and headed for the door.

"Where are you going?"

"If you need me, Commander, I have a conversation to finish. Until then, you have the bridge."

"Aye Shipmaster."


	2. Chapter 2

Pidge was a blur as she darted in-between the various stations aboard the _Corsair's_ bridge, stopping for a few seconds at each one to gaze over the shoulder of whatever unlucky sailor happened to be manning it. In that time, she'd have bombarded the poor soul with as many questions as physically possible before leaving to repeat the process on one of their comrades. The young Paladin went about her business under the disapproving gaze of the ship's first mate, Commander Shrike. The bitter Commander was currently positioned next to her superior, who, unlike his second, found their guest's actions rather amusing. Something about watching her dart around in a desperate attempt to satisfy her own curiosity put a smile on his face.

"Shipmaster, I mean you no disrespect, but is it really such a good idea to let her wander around the bridge like this?" Shrike whispered, attempting to hide her comment from not only Pidge, but the rest of the bridge.

"Are you questioning my authority, Commander?" he answered.

"No Shipmaster, it's just, what if she is a Galra spy? I'm just saying, we should be more cautious."

"What's she going to do? We're standing right here; there's nowhere on this bridge that we can't see. Even if she's a spy, which I assure you she's not, she can't sabotage anything without us noticing."

"What if she tries to send some kind of message back to her Galra handlers?" Shrike asked, refusing to drop the subject.

"If she tries to send some kind of message Lieutenant Zek will simply intercept it. And even if he doesn't, she can't access any classified information without us realizing it. The worst she could possibly do is give away our location, something the Galra could easily find out on their own. Besides, if she really is a Voltron Paladin, and I believe she is, it may prove detrimental to our relations if we do anything to alienate her. And I don't know about you, but I'd prefer not to make an enemy out of someone who can wield the most dangerous weapon in the universe." Sun said, managing to intimidate the women despite the fact that he was calmly whispering. With his second placated, Sun turned his attention back to his young guest, who was currently in the middle of interrogating Lieutenant Zek about the nature of his job.

"Miss Holt, I'd prefer it if you didn't give my tactical officer a heart attack." He joked, referencing the look of terror and panic the poor Lieutenant had plastered across his face.

"I'm sorry Captain, it's just that I've never been aboard the bridge of a battleship before. Well, technically I have if you count the Castle of Lions, but Allura always flew that and I was always too busy training or fighting monsters to learn how anything worked. Not that fighting monsters wasn't fun, I mean it was amazing, but I still would have liked to learn about the ship's systems."

"Wait just a tick," Lieutenant Tar interrupted. "Why was your ship called the Castle of Lions?"

"Well, it really wasn't a ship, more like a giant flying castle. That was also a ship. So I guess it really was a ship, but it could also be a castle. Or the other way around. Honestly they never really explained how it worked." She answered, confusing herself.

"You guys have a flying castle? That's amazing! Shipmaster, why don't we have one of those?"

"Because, Lieutenant, we're not mythical Paladins in charge of defending the Universe using five flying robot lions." Sun deadpanned in response.

"I didn't mean us in particular. Just, why didn't we ever build one of those? The kingdom I mean." Tar asked, shrugging.

"Because," Ensign Caz said, joining the conversation. "that seems both idiotic and impractical. No offense, Miss Holte."

"None taken. But I do have to say the castle…."

Suddenly Vex shouted "BRACE" at the top of his lungs milliseconds before the whole ship began to shake violently. Some unknown object had collided with the ship's hull. The force of this unknown impact was so great that both Sun and Shrike lost their footing and were knocked clear off the command platform. Pidge would have suffered a similar fate, had she not quickly steadied herself against a wall. Luckily, the rest of the ship's command staff were all seated allowing them to react in spite of their superior's current inability to dispense orders. Vex frantically wrestled with the ship's helm in a desperate attempt to steady the shaking vessel. Not a second after he'd managed to accomplish this task Sun leaped to his feet, already attempting to get a bearing on their current situation.

"Vex, what the hell did we just hit?" he screamed as he made his way back to his command platform. Upon reaching it he engaged his armor's magnetic boots, locking himself in place.

"A Galra ship dropped out of hyperspeed and scraped alongside us. I'm sorry sir, I couldn't dodge it." Vex answered, a look of defeat in his eyes.

"Never mind that, where the hell did it go?!"

"They're behind us, sir. I think they trying to turn around and make another go at us."

"Bring the _Corsair_ about, I want to face them head on, try and give them as small a target as possible. Zek, I need a tactile readout on that ship and a status report, now! Tar, ready all weapons and target that ship. Shrike, Katie are you two okay?!"

"I'm fine" Pidge answered, still propped up against a wall for support. "but I think the Commander's unconscious." She said gesturing towards Shrike as she lay in an awkward pile on the deck.

"Sir, should I call for a medical team?" Ensign Caz asked as he frantically tapped away at his control panel.

"Aye, but first I need you to sound the call for general quarters! Zek where the hell is my Sitrep?!" Sun shouted, snapping the terrified young lieutenant back to reality.

"Sorry, sir. We seem to be okay for the most part. Structural damage is negligible; our shields, on the other hand, are down to almost twenty-five percent normal strength. We get rammed like that again and we're finished. The enemy vessel is defiantly a Galra battleship, but it's been severely damaged. Multiple structural failures, hull breaches on all decks and their weapons seem to be offline. Only a hand full of life forms aboard. Most of its crew must be dead. It must be being manned by a skeleton crew and a bunch of sentries." He finished his voice shaking like crazy.

"Sir" Vex cried out. "the enemy ships come about and they're heading right for us!"

"They must be trying to ram us! Helmsmen, evasive maneuvers now!"

Once again the ship started to violently lurch back and forth. Only this time it was on purpose. Thanks to Vex, they'd managed to narrowly avoid another impact with the suicidal vessel. The enemy craft had passed within meters of the _Corsair's_ hull, so close in fact that bits of debris from the ship's various wounds had gone flying off, eventually colliding with the _Corsair's_ shield. Hunks of burning metal ricocheted off the particle barrier before impacting the ship from which they'd originated, worsening the already severe damage. Having once again survived an attempted ramming, the _Corsair_ swung around as quickly as possible, pointing its bow directly at the Galra ship before it. Aboard her bridge Sun shouted orders to his command staff, attempting to formulate a strategy with which to defeat his opponent. Unlike his previous engagement, the _Corsair_ had neither the advantage in size nor armor. Under normal circumstances, he'd have a speed advantage but with the ships weapons offline the Galra crew was diverting all the power they could to the engines. That meant all he had was an advantage in firepower, but with the enemy vessel constantly making suicide runs at him it was nearly impossible to target vital systems before they were forced to take evasive action. That meant the only thing they had a clear shot at was the ship's bow, which was covered in thick armor. Armor, which was more than capable of absorbing the few shots they actually managed to get off before being forced to desperately maneuver out of the way to avoid a collision. The only thing they had that could punch through it was the ion canon, but they couldn't use it. At the speed the Galra ship was going, there was no way they could charge, aim, and fire the cannon before being forced to move. And if they stayed still long enough to fire it, they'd be destroyed upon colliding with the ship's wreckage. As far as Sun could tell it seemed like a lose-lose situation, that was until Pidge had an idea.

"Sun." She shouted, struggling to keep her balance as the ship once again lurched to avoid a collision.

"Yes Miss Holte!" he shouted back.

"If we can take out their bridge they'll be dead in the water."

"You don't think we know that. The problem is getting a clear shot on it while they're trying to kill us." Tar screamed inserting himself into their conversation.

"Well, what if we charged straight at them, but, at the last second, we boast over them. That would give us a clear shot at the bridge."

"Our guns can't fire directly below as like that," Tar yelled, once again dismissing her idea.

"What if we tilted the ship to one side? That way the batteries would have a clear line of sight on the bridge."

Sun thought the plan over in his head. It was crazy, and if they messed up they'd end up crashing head first into a Galra battleship, but it's all they had. And they were getting desperate

"Tar divert all power from the ion canon to the other batteries and prepare a full starboard broadside on my mark. Zek, focus shields at the bow. Helmsmen, full speed ahead directly at the enemy vessel." Sun ordered, a strange mix of confidence and desperation in his voice. A mix that was echoed by the chorus of 'Ayes' he received in response. And so, the two titans raced towards one another, neither showing any sign of stopping. As they went various blue beams shot from the _Corsair_ , impacting the Galra ship. Each hit burned away at the hull, damaging the already wounded ship, though not enough to stop its suicidal advance. As the two grew closer the Galra ship seemed to give off a mighty war cry as its engines roared accelerating the ship closer to its unavoidable doom at an even more rapid pass. Soon, the _Corsair_ let out a cry of its own as it drastically increased its own speed. It was almost as if the two ships were engaged in a joust, the two armored war machines playing the parts of noble knights struggling to defeat one another on the field of honor. But, just before the two combatants were about to meet, dozens of boosters positioned on the _Corsair's_ underbelly shot to life, lifting the vessel. It appeared as though the _Corsair_ was literally leaping over its opponent twisting ever so slightly as she hurtled her target. As soon as she'd turned so that her side armament was now facing the top of the enemy vessel the mighty ship unleashed a full broadside at near point blank range, sending shockwaves through the void of space. Soon, the poor vessel's bridge was engulfed in flames as its surface erupted in a series of devastating explosions. By the end of it, the ship had been completely decimated. What had once been the bridge had been reduced to a mass of deformed metal. The whole ship looked as though someone had begun to melt away the various decks starting at the top. Without its bridge, the vessel's few surviving systems fired off uncontrollably. Thus, the ship's mangled wreck continued to drift off into the empty void of space. It's engine's dying gasps propelling it further into nothingness. It truly was a haunting sight to behold, but Sun cared little about what he'd just done. The only thought on his mind was the well-being of his ship and his crew. Nothing else mattered, not until he was certain both were safe from harm.

"Lieutenant Zek, status report." He said, his rage replaced by the stern focus his crew had become accustomed to.

"Aye Shipmaster." His subordinate replayed, still visibly shaken by what they'd all just experienced. "The enemy ship has been destroyed, Miss Holt's plan worked. Due to the close proximity of the enemy vessel when we fired of broadside we suffered some minor damage. Our shields are gone and we have a few minor hull breaches on the lower decks. Luckily none of them are in areas occupied crew. We should be okay to complete our journey to Amicus." The young lieutenant said, finishing with a sigh of relief.

"Are you okay Lieutenant? Would you like to be relieved?" Sun asked fearing the young officer would soon pass out.

"No Shipmaster, I'll be fine. I think." Zek answered, mumbling the last part so it was only audible to himself.

"Well, it looks like you cut it a little close, Helmsman. I fear you may have wrecked the paint job with that one." Sun said with a slight chuckle.

"Aye Shipmaster, I'm sorry. I promise I won't let it happen again." Vex replied, clearly missing the joke.

"Don't worry about it Vex, I don't pay to repair this thing anyway," he replied trying to lift the helmsmen's spirits. "Ensign, I thought I ordered a medical team."

"You did Shipmaster, there on their way, the shaking probably just held them up a bit."

"Good. While we're the topic, where did Commander Shrike end up?" He asked, deactivating his magnetic boots and stepping down from his command platform. After a quick look around he found his second laying on the deck in the rear of the bridge. Pidge was knelt down beside her, treating her wounds as best she could. Sun soon joined her in her efforts.

"How is she?" he asked his voice void of worry. Pidge couldn't tell if this was because he really didn't care or if he was simply hiding his concerns.

"She hit her hit pretty hard when she fell. And I'm sure being tossed around like a rag doll didn't help her any. Do you think she's going be okay?" Unlike Sun, her concern was evident in her voice.

"Don't worry, she'll be fine. Trust me, she's a lot tougher than she looks." Just then four soldiers came onto the bridge carrying a stretcher. Sun then lifted Shrike off the deck and placed her on the stretcher so she could be taken to the ship's medical bay.

"Why'd they do that? The Galra, why were they trying to ram us like that?"

"Why do you think?" Caz responded from across the bridge. "They're Galra, they're all insane."

"It's just, I've never seen anything like that. I knew they take that whole "Victory or Death" thing pretty seriously but, I never thought... I didn't think they'd willing to sacrifice themselves like that just to win." The young Paladin's voice was filled with a stunned disbelief Sun was all too familiar with.

"They weren't trying to win. Sometimes, if a Galra ship's critically damaged, it'll try to crash itself into one of our vessels. I've seen it happen a few times, but those were small ships. Destroyers and frigates mostly, I've never seen a battleship try anything like that."

"Where'd they even come from anyway?" Lieutenant Tar asked, typing away at his control console. "There's no way a damaged Galra battleship made it past all the pickets we have stationed at the border."

"There's no time to worry about that know. Ensign, send crews to repair the hull. Helmsmen, set us back on course for Amicus. The sooner we reach System Command, the sooner we can stop worrying about attacks like this.

"And the sooner I can take a look at the Green Lion, right?" Pidge said. She'd been meaning to take a look at it since she'd learned it wasn't working. Unfortunately, the _Corsair's_ hanger bay didn't have the space or equipment she needed to start the repairs. Hopefully, the planet they were heading towards would have everything she needed, if not she wouldn't be flying anytime soon.

"Well," Sun replied, "let's just hope we don't run into any more surprises."

...

The _Corsair_ dropped out of hyperspace and came face to face with a truly dismal scene. They'd expected to be greeted by the calming sight of Amicus, the system's capital and home to the port that resupplied every ship operating in the area. For the countless crews stationed in the system, news that they'd soon be returning to Amicus was always call for celebration. It meant they'd soon be able to enjoy a much-needed stint of shore leave, free of the ever-present danger of being ambushed by a Galra raiding ship. Instead, however, they were greeted with the haunting sight of a ship graveyard. The shattered remains of over two dozen vessels were crowded together forming a massive debris field obscuring the view of the lush green planet beyond. As the _Corsair_ slowly began to make its way through the mass of destroyed vessels towards the planet itself, the ship's command staff looked on in horror as the remains of what had once been a Lincar destroyer drifted past.

"Well," Pidge said, breaking the eerie silence that currently gripped the bridge. "I guess we figured where that battleship came from." Just as she finished speaking, a whole squadron of wrecked Galra fighters impacted harmlessly off what remained of the _Corsair's_ shield. "I thought you said this place was heavily defended, why would the Galra attack here? Especially with a such a small fleet? There couldn't be more than a dozen Galra ships here."

"I don't know Miss Holt, I just don't know." something about his voice seemed off to her. It was still the stern commanding tone she'd come to expect from the shipmaster, but something about it made her uneasy. He might not have been showed it but deep down Sun was deeply troubled by what he was seeing. "The Galra have been willing to sacrifice men to achieve victory, but this is different. There's no reason for them to launch an attack like this. It's nothing but pointless violence and it's not right. These men deserved better, my friends deserved better. They'll pay for this; I swear they will."

Suddenly Lieutenant Zek called out turning Sun's attention away from the grizzly scene outside. "Shipmaster, we're receiving a signal from the planet's surface. I believe it's Duchess Merlin."

"On screen." He ordered, gesturing to the large window at the front of the bridge. A large translucent blue screen suddenly materialized itself in front of the window. Displayed on the screen was a woman Pidge assumed was Duchess Merlin. When Sun had told her she was going to be meeting a duchess, she'd expected it to be like the first time she met Allura, minus Lance nearly getting his ear ripped off. With Allura, the fact that she was a Princess didn't really seem all that important. In fact, if she hadn't told them they probably would have never figured out about her royal title. But this was entirely different. It was clear just by how she looked she was important. She was clearly older than Sun, though by how much, Pidge could not tell. She had shoulder length silver hair that covered the right side of her face. Her left eye was an intense fiery red color that perfectly matched the highlights of her ornate armor as well as the cape she had draped over her shoulders. Perhaps her most striking feature was her sapphire lips which sparkled ever so slightly in the well-lit room from which she was broadcasting. Despite the fact that she wasn't even in the same room, she still managed to intimidate not only Pidge, but almost everyone else on the bridge. Luckily all that stopped as soon as the duchess began to speak.

"If it isn't Sun Vac. It's great to see you, you crazy so and so. How the hell are you?" Pidge couldn't believe what she'd just heard. There's no way the voice she just heard came from the women on the screen in front of her. It's not that her voice didn't sound like that of someone royal, it was loud and booming just like she'd expected, but her tone and vocabulary seemed far too familiar and friendly for someone of noble birth.

Once she'd finished, Sun placed his hand to his chest and bowed his head before beginning to speak. "It's good to see you too, Your Grace. I've been fine, all things considered. We did have a rather hectic encounter with a damaged Galra battleship near the edge of the system. Would you happen to know anything about where it may have come from?" Unlike the Duchess, Sun's voice was formal and professional, void of any sense of familiarity.

"A battleship you say, yeah I know where that came from. We managed to take out every Galra ship except for one, their command ship got away after it's been shot up pretty bad. And what did I tell you about all that "Your Grace" stuff? If you have to be formal just call me ma'am."

"My apologies, Ma'am." He said once again bowing his head.

"Don't sweat it, it really is good to you Sun. It feels like I haven't seen you in years."

"Why? We saw each other three months ago, while the _Corsair_ was in port."

"Wait, really? Are you sure, I don't seem to recall that? Are you sure you're not thinking of something else?" she said, scratching her head in confusion.

"With all due respect ma'am, I was defiantly here. Don't you remember? You invited me to that party you threw for your second cousin, it was actually quite nice until people started dying."

"Oh yeah, now I remember. That party I throw with the fancy wine. The one where you killed those two waiters."

"Once again, I'd like to say how sorry I am about that."

"Ah, don't be; they did try to stab you. Wait, if I recall correctly didn't one of them actually stab you."

While those two continued to reminisce about their past interactions Pidge watched on in stunned amazement. It was crazy, watching Sun and the Duchess go back and forth discussing various crazy events each had experienced occasionally making reference to a war they'd both apparently fought in. Something about Sun's stern professionalism juxtaposed against the Duchess's eccentricity made their interaction seem all the more surreal. She was so enthralled by the duo's conversation, that she almost didn't notice when her name suddenly appeared.

"Lady Holt, it's my pleasure to introduce you to Duchess Amethyst Elizabeth Merlin the Second, governor of this entire sector," Sun said, introducing the young Paladin to the Duchess.

"So you're this "Defender of the Universe" I've heard so much about," Amethyst said smiling. "you're the one Sun told me he found floating around in a massive green lion. Well, if half the stories I've heard about Voltron are true, I'd love to see one of the lions in action."

"I wish I could give you a demonstration, but I'm afraid my lion's suffering from some technical difficulties. I was actually hoping I could use your facilities for the repairs."

"Well Katie, I'd be honored if you'd use our port. But first I believe we have a more important matter to attend to. Sun tells me you wish to establish a partnership between the Kingdom of Lincar and The Voltron Alliance."

"Yes, with your help I'm sure we can defeat the Galra and free the Universe from Zarkon's oppressive rule." Her voice full of hope and enthusiasm.

"Yes, I'm sure we will, unfortunately, I lack the authority to make such a decision on my own. For that, you'd need to talk to the queen, and to get a meeting with her you're going to have to do a lot of negotiating. Which means we have a lot of work ahead of us, young Paladin." Amethyst said, her upbeat and cheerful tone being replaced with one far more serious. It was clear to Pidge that this was no laughing matter. If she was going to establish any kind of agreement between the Alliance and the Lincar it would require a lot of political maneuvering. An area she was not particularly skilled in. It was one of the reasons she'd been so happy when Sun had told her the Duchess would be willing to help her. Having someone with experience dealing with politicians would be a valuable asset. Despite this, she was still rather unsure about whether or not she was up for the task. Either way, Amethyst was right. They all had a lot of work to do.


	3. Chapter 3

Pidge was completely awestruck as she walked down the stone pathway that led up to a huge white Mansion. The estate, being the only building in the area, took advantage of all the free space. The whole complex was spread out over miles and miles of land forming a massive circle. This circle was in turn surrounded by a lush and well-kept garden filled with topiaries, fountains, and various other picturesque objects. The sheer size and beauty of the mansion made the Castle of Lions seem almost, insignificant, in comparison.

"So, the Duchess is really the only person living in this huge fancy mansion, estate thing?" She asked, turning towards Sun. The young Captain was but one of the people accompanying her. The pair was joined by four of Sun's bodyguards, known as Lancers. They each wore simple white armor and carried blaster rifles. The four guards followed Pidge and Sun as they slowly made their way towards the massive house in front of them.

"Yes," Sun responded, his eyes locked on the building in front of them.

"Doesn't that seem kind of excessive, having all this house for just one person."

"Well, technically the servants also live here. And a company of soldiers that serves as guards for the Duchess. There's also a hanger bay with a full squadron of starfighters to help protect against attacks. That's also where we're going to be bringing your lion. Hopefully, you can use the tools there to perform the necessary repairs." He really did want Pidge to fix her lion as soon as possible. Partially because it meant one of the most effective weapons they had against the Galra would be operational again, and partially because he really wanted to see what the legendary Lions of Voltron were like in person. Ever since he was a child, he'd heard stories of the mighty lions and their Paladins, amazing warriors capable of wiping out entire fleets of Galra ships.

"Still, it seems like she'd get pretty lonely." She said. "Doesn't she have a family or something?"

"The Duchess doesn't have any close relatives. She did have a fiance once but, he died years ago."

"Well, that's depressing." Pidge said, not quite sure how to respond.

"Duchess Merlin has gone through quite a lot in her lifetime, but you'd be hard pressed to find someone half as cheerful or kind as she is. I've known her for quite some time, and so far, no one else even comes close."

"How long have you two known each other? It's just, you seem to know a lot about her, and back on the ship, she talked about that party you two were at. How'd you two even meet anyway, I mean are you like a Duke or something? I'm not saying normal people can't mean royalty, but I've never a Duchess. Well, I have met a princess before, but that was a special circumstance, me being a Paladin and all. I guess you are a Captain and all, but there's got to be a lot of Captains..." Pidge spoke rapidly. Only stopping for a few brief moments before continuing to bombard Sun with questions. Eventually, the young Shipmaster began to lose track of what exactly he was being asked and so he decided to simply answer the first question he remembered.

"I've known Duchess Merlin for quite some time now. I met her back during the last war we had with the Glara. She wasn't a Duchess back then; she didn't get that title until after the war but she was my commanding officer."

"So what, she was just like and an officer or something?"

"Not exactly, during the war she was a High Admiral. About half way through the war I was lucky enough to be reassigned to her command fleet, that's when I first met her. Over the next few years, we spent a good deal of time together, discussing various strategies and tactics with which to fight the Galra. After the war, her father and mother passed away leaving her to govern the sector, and one of her first orders of business was to appoint me Shipmaster of the _Corsair_." He said, a smile slowly forming on his face.

"So she's the reason you're in command of the _Corsair_?" Pidge asked.

Suddenly, a familiar voice injected itself into the pair's conversation. "No, I simply gave him a command better suiting his tactile prowess. He earned that position fair and square, I was just lucky enough to be the one to reward him." The two turned to face Duchess Merlin and a pair of guards dressed in ornate plate armor carrying lances as they walked to greet their guests. It was then that Pidge realized just how tall Merlin really was. While she hadn't been able to determine her height with any form of accuracy during their previous conversation, her true stature was now abundantly clear. The noble woman was nearly a foot taller than her guards, both of whom were roughly Sun's height. Her tall stature only seemed to add to her royal demeanor, a demeanor which once again crumbled the moment she began to speak.

"Sun, you lousy pile of ash, it's great to finally get to see you in person after all this time." She said surprising Pidge. The Duchess and her guards were more than twenty yards away and yet; she could clearly hear every word. She wasn't even raising her voice, her normal tone somehow managing to carry her words all the way to her intended target.

"As I've already said Ma'am, we saw each other three months ago." Sun politely corrected, having to yell slightly as to be heard.

"Yeah and three months is a long time?"

"Not really Ma'am."

"Didn't your mother every tell you never to argue with a woman. It's rather rude."

"I'm sorry Ma'am."

"Don't worry Sun, I'm just messing with you." She said with a smile big enough for Pidge to see, even from this far away.

"Hey Sun," the young paladin whispered.

"Why are you whispering?"

"Because, I don't want the Duchess to hear me."

"Why?"

"Because, I kind of want to know what's with the scary looking guys in plate armor. And I'm not sure if it's rude to ask something like that."

"Those are her guards, there just Lancers."

"Wait, those guys are Lancers?"

"Yes, is there something weird about that?"

"No, it's just, why aren't your guys dressed like that?"

"Lancer is just a ceremonial title given to those charged with protecting people of importance. It could be literally anyone given such a task."  
"Okay, then why are they dressed like that?"

"Because the Duchess is a bit eccentric, especially when it comes to appearances." He said, smirking. As soon as they'd finished their conversation the Duchess walked up to them and wrapped Sun in a massive bear huge lifting him clear off the ground and causing an audible crack. Pidge was a bit taken back by this. She didn't expect the Duchess to be so strong. She also didn't expect Sun to react so coldly. The poor man was completely stone-faced, like a statue. It made the whole thing look really awkward. Eventually, the Duchess put Sun down before turning her attention to Pidge.

"No offense, Your Grace, but I'm not much of a hugger." She said, backing away in terror.

"Don't worry little one, I'm not going to crush you." She said placing her hand on the young Paladin's shoulder. "I only do that to Sun because I love to see how he reacts." She said chuckling to herself. "It is nice to finally meet you face to face. If all the stories I've heard about Voltron are true, I'd be more than happy to help you negotiate some type of arrangement between the Voltron Alliance and the Kingdom of Lincar."

"I could sure use your help. I'm not exactly, skilled, in the art of negotiation." She said with an awkward laugh.

"Well lucky for you, I am. Growing up in a noble family may not have always been a cake walk but it did have its advantages. Learning to deal with other nobles for example. And if you're hoping to be a diplomat, you're gonna have to learn how to fit in just like I did. Unfortunately, we don't have a lot of time. The Gala's in two days and you need to be ready to go." She said a huge smile still plastered on her face.

"Wait, what Gala?" she asked as she watched the Duchess start back towards the front door of her massive estate.

"It's tradition for a Diplomat to hold a Gala to introduce herself to the various nobles. Since you don't have an estate of your own, we're be holding it here at my estate." She called back over her shoulder "Come along dear we have work to do."

"Wait, wasn't this planet just attacked? There's like two dozen busted ships in orbit and you want to throw a party." Pidge said exasperatedly.

"If we dropped everything we were doing every time the Galra attacked, we'd never get anything done around here."

"Well, isn't Sun coming with us?

"I wish I could Miss Holt, but I have other matters to attend to. The _Corsair_ is need of repairs, Commander Shrike is still unconscious and there's a magical green lion in my hanger bay that needs to be unload. So if you don't mind, I'll take my leave." He said bowing his head. Then he and his Lancers did a quick about face and began the journey back down the long stone pathway leading to a small landing pad. At this point, Pidge was rather confused as to what was going on. Not seeing any other option, she followed the Duchess towards her estate where she was apparently hosting a Gala. She was actually rather excited, something about hosting a Gala made her fill like a Princess. Unfortunately, that feeling wouldn't last for long.

...

"Ow," Pidge screamed as she was once again jabbed with a small sewing needle. The young Paladin was standing on a short platform as a robot darted around her, making adjustments to the half-finished gown she was wearing. "Is this really the best way to do this?" she asked Duchess Merlin, who was sitting on a small chair a few feet away watching as the robot made Pidge's dress.

"Well, we could have it done by hand, but that would take too long." She answered as she leaned back in her chair. "Besides, you'd stop getting pricked if stood still like I told you."

"Well, it's kind of hard to stand still and have a conversation with you at the same time. OW! You know I never thought I could ever hate a robot but this little jerks really starting to tick me off."

"Yeah, I always hated that little bastard too, but he does come in handy. Now were where we?" the Duchess said scratching her head.

"You were telling me about the queen I thin... OW! Stupid robot!"

"Oh yeah. You see, the Queen is the leader of the whole Kingdom. She makes all the important decisions, if you want to establish any kind of treaty between the Voltron Alliance and the Kingdom, you'll have to talk to her personally. To do that you'll need the support of a few of the lesser lords and nobles, like me." She said pointing to herself.

"Wait why? Can't I just speak to her now?"

"You can try. It won't work, but you can try." The Duchess said shrugging.

"Wel, l why not?" she asked clearly, agitated.

"You see, most Lincar have trouble trusting outsiders. Especially not the Noble ones. It takes a while for them to trust people, so chances are any requests we send will just go unanswered. So, you have to gain the trust of a group of lesser nobles who can vouch for you with the queen."

"No offense, Your Grace…."

"I told you, call me Amy."

"Okay, no offense Amy, but that's stupid. Like really stupid."

"Yeah, it kind of is. Unfortunately, I didn't make the system I just know how to work it. And that's what I'm going to teach you."

"Okay, if I just need some noble to vouch for me, aren't you enough."

"If you want to see the queen you're gonna need a lot more supporters than just me."

"This diplomacy thing seems like a real drag," Pidge said, sighing.

"It really is, that's why I didn't want any part of it. Unfortunately, life had different plans." Amy said, a small hint of sadness in her voice.

"What do you mean?"

"Well, I actually joined the military so I wouldn't have to take on my parent's responsibilities. Unfortunately, they died before having any more children, meaning I didn't have much of a choice." She said, her voice drifting ever closer to one of depression. "It's not all bad, though, there are some perks. Getting to through extravagate parties for example." She finished, her happy tone returning.

"Speaking of parties, remind me again why we're throwing one."

"Well, normally if we were going to do this whole diplomacy thing we'd have to do a lot of really corrupt stuff. Bribery, arranged marriages, threats, stuff like that. But, seeing as you lack the resources to do any of that, we're gonna have to do this the old fashion way, with charisma. And the best place to start is by throwing a Gala and inviting a bunch of other Nobles. If all goes well, you'll get invited to one of their parties and so on and so on until you've built up some kind of positive reputation. Then hopefully you can get to know a few nobles well enough that they agree to help you get an audience with the queen."

"That seems overly complicated and kind of dumb."

"Well honestly it kind of is, but it's the only way."

"Okay, I guess that makes some kind of weird sense. But why do we have to have it so soon, I mean you said it yourself, two days isn't a lot of time to prepare me for this. It's not like I'm in any kind of rush. I mean I'm stuck here anyway. Why not take my time a little and, you know actually prepare for this thing instead of rushing around like this?" Once she finished Amy's face slowly shifted to a serious expression. It was almost like Pidge had said something to upset her, though what she had no idea.

"Pidge, I'm about to tell you something but you have to promise me not to freak out. Okay." She said as she leaned forward in her seat. It was clear from her voice that she was serious. Pidge was actually fairly concerned by this. Unsure how to respond the young Paladin hesitantly nodded.

"Now you have to understand, I didn't tell you this before because I didn't want to upset you. I thought it best to simply try and handle things discreetly and let you focus on getting ready but it may be best for you to know now. The attack on this planet wasn't really an attack. As far as we could tell the fleet that attacked us was actually trying to ambush the _Corsair_ but their timing was off, they showed up too soon and were destroyed because of it."

"So what? The Galra are trying to kill me, that's not exactly breaking news."

"You don't understand. The only way they could have known the _Corsair_ was coming here is if someone tipped them off. That means I have a traitor in my mists, and that is something that deeply troubles me. If they know you're here, and they have a man on the inside, there's nothing stopping them from making an attempt on your life."

"So, like I said they've tried to kill me before. It didn't work then and it's not gonna work now."  
"I don't think you understand Miss Holt, many of my friends have been killed by Galra assassins. While you have been able to defeat the Galra in open combat if they send their agents you'll need more than combat skills. You'll need total security, and that's not something I can offer, at least not while there's a Galra spy running around. The best way to keep you safe is to put you on a ship where you'll be constantly moving, that way they won't be able to track you down so easily. Now I can't just give you a ship, I may be a Duchess but I still have people I answer to and they won't let me assign some random alien to one of my warships for no reason, but if you became a prominent diplomat you'd need some way to travel around the Kingdom on diplomatic missions as well as some kind of resistance."

"Then you could lend me one of your ships to use," Pidge said, finally catching on.

"Exactly, but again, the only way I'm going to be able to justify something like that is if you really are a prominent diplomat, and this Gala is the best way to start."

"Okay, but shouldn't we still be worried about this spy? What if the Galra try and kill me before the Gala?"

"Don't worry about that, I've got Sun and his crew bolstering the normal garrison. We might not be able to stop their agents, but all the security will definitely slow them down for a few days. And once all the guests arrive for the party with their own guards and ships it'll be suicide to try anything. So you'll be safe for at least the next few days but I can't promise you anything after that."

Pidge really wasn't sure how to respond to that. She tried as hard as she could to remain claim, to not worry about the fact that apparently the Galra Empire was sending a bunch of highly trained assassins after her and there was nothing she could do to stop them, but she was failing. Her expression immediately shifted to one of dread and despair and she began to feel ill. Having to fight the Galra head on was one thing but how was she supposed to stop a spy she couldn't even see or an assassin that might not even be there. To be honest, she was really starting to regret this whole "get the Kingdom to join the Alliance" thing, but it's not like she had much of a choice. She was stuck on the other side of the known universe with no backup, if she wanted to survive she'd need their help. Not to mention the fact that with their help they might actually be able to defeat the Galra empire. Even so, Pidge started to question whether all that was worth putting a big red bullseye on her back. At least back with the others if things got bad they could form Voltron but here she was on her own and her lion didn't even work. Unfortunately, she'd have to wait to repair it later. Apparently, she was preoccupied learning how to both negotiate with racist aliens and avoid highly trains Galra assassins. And as the young Paladin was once again jabbed by the small sewing robot, she couldn't help but wish she was back at home far away from any of this crazy alien business. Unfortunately, that wish would never come true, she was a Paladin of Voltron and that meant she had to defend the Universe, no matter what.


	4. Chapter 4

A dull thud echoed off the walls as Pidge collided with the polished wood floors of the massive ballroom. Seemingly defeated, the young Paladin decided to simply lie, face to the floor, groaning like a zombie.

"Are you okay Lady Holt?" Duchess Merlin asked from across the room.

"Why is this dress so hard to walk in? I spend three hours yesterday getting it fit, why is it so uncomfortable?"

"Because, if it was comfortable, it wouldn't a gown."

"That doesn't really make me feel better." She said, still face down on the floor.

"Well, you can't say I didn't try. Come on dear, let's give it one more go."

"Do I have to? Haven't I fallen on my face enough for one day?" Pidge asked as she sat up. Her voice was a mixture of sarcasm and defeat.

"Clearly, you haven't spent enough time with the Duchess." A familiar voice called out from behind her. She recognized it as the voice of Sun, one of the few people around here she considered a friend. "Falling on your face is part of the experience." The young captain said as he made his way over to the seated paladin. After helping the young woman to her feet he turned his attention to the Duchess bowing his head before addressing her. "The perpetrations have been completed just you requested ma'am. My men are patrolling the complex as we speak, if anyone does manage to get in here we'll find them."

"What about the green lion?" Pidge asked, concerned.

"Your magical green lion has been safely stored in the Duchess's private hanger," Sun said, struggling to remain serious while saying such an absurd sentence. "You don't have to worry about keeping it safe either. I swear I'll guard it with my life." He said tapping the handle of his sidearm.

"You won't be attending the Gala?" Pidge asked, clearly concerned. The thought of facing a bunch of snobby nobles without her new comrade by her side honestly worried her quite a bit. It was bad enough she had to go through this without her team now she had to face this challenge alone, it was a little overwhelming. "If it's all the same with you I'd prefer if you attended the party with me, for support."

"You'll be fine," he said, placing his hand upon her shoulder. "the Duchess will be right there by your side the whole time. I trust her with my life and I assure you she'd die before she let anything happen to you." He said, his words managing to lift the young girl's spirits.

"Besides" Amy called out as she made her way over across the room. "Sun doesn't exactly thrive in social situations."

"It's true, I'd take a stint aboard a starship over a party any day. Besides, with all the extra security running around someone needs to coordinate the patrols to make sure there are no gaps. Especially if we're planning on letting a bunch of random people just come walking in here."

"They're not a bunch of random people Sun," the Duchess said as she threw her arm over the young captain's shoulders, "The only names on the guest list are those of people I know quite well."

"No offense ma'am, but I've seen the guest list, I've heard you say on a number of occasions you can't stand most of these people."

"I knew them, I never said I liked them." The Duchess said, her comment managing to get a small chuckle from her two guests.

"Well, if it's all the same with you I'll be taking my leave now," Sun said as he made his way towards the door.

"Leaving so soon old friend? I'm starting to think you don't like spending time with me." The Duchess asked.

"I mean nothing by it, ma'am. Honestly, I wish I could stay, but there's a magical green lion in your hanger bay and it's not going to protect itself." He said once again struggling to keep a serious tone. He had a feeling he'd be doing that a lot in the perceivable future.

"Actually," Pidge chimed in "Most of the time it actually does protect itself. If it worked right now there'd be a magical energy bubble surrounding it making sure no one but me could get inside. It's rather interesting really, the systems behind it are pretty advanced. I can explain it to you if you like." Pidge said, obviously excited to share what she'd learned with her new friends.

"Why don't you accompany Sun to hanger bay then? You two can talk on the way." The Duchess said, a massive smile plastered across her face.

"Really?" Pidge asked wide eyed. She'd been dying to finally take a look at her lion. For days now her mind had been racing thinking of just why and how her lion had lost power. In fact, as far as she knew it should have been impossible for something like that to happen. And yet it had, a fact which perplexed the young paladin to no end. The mere idea of getting to solve such a technological conundrum filled her glee. In fact, the only reason she wasn't working on her lion at this very moment was Amy's insistence on preparing her for this Gala.

"You've been working hard over the past few days, you deserve a break. Go ahead, besides, I wouldn't mind finally getting to see one of the legendary Voltron lions in action. But, if you're planning on doing any mechanical work, I would suggest changing into something more appropriate." Amy said, gesturing at the elegant gown the young paladin was wearing. With that, Pidge took off down the hall after Sun smiling all the way. Once she'd managed to catch up to the young captain she began what would soon prove to be a rather one-sided conversation concerning the various advanced magical technologies involved in the function of her lion. As the pair made their way towards the hanger bay the cheerful words of the young paladin echoing throughout the long halls of the estate.

...

"So they were, rock people?" Sun called up to Pidge as she sat atop her lion tapping away at a large tablet. The young paladin, now adorned in her normal armor, was reviewing a wide variety of measurements and readouts roughly translated from Lincar to English. A task she found rather difficult thanks to the rudimentary understanding her new friends had of her native language. Never the less she reveled in the opportunity to overcome such a challenge. If there was one sure fire thing to make her feel better, it was talking a seemingly impossible feat of technical engineering.

"Well," she responded her eyes still fix on the screen before her. "I don't think they were actually made of rocks. I mean they certainly looked like rocks but really, sentient space rocks. The thing just sounds ridiculous. But yeah, there was an entire civilization living on that Balmera. The Galra basically used them as slaves to help mine the crystals, it was actually pretty depressing. Some of them had never even seen the sky before we showed up, can you image that?"

"Actually, I know exactly what that's like," Sun mumbled as he leaned up against the leg of the magical vessel.

"What was that?"

"Nothing Miss Holt. It is rather strange, you and your team finding sentient life on a Balmera."

"What do you mean?" she asked leaning over the side so she could look down at her friend.

"Well," he responded as he nervously stared up at the young Paladin. Most of the Balmera I've visited didn't even have an atmosphere, let alone an ecosystem. The fact that you managed to find one with a whole civilization living on it is, incredible."

"So, you guys use Balmera crystals too?" Pidge asked still precariously leaning over the side.

"Not all of them, but a lot of bigger ships do use Balmera crystals as a power source."

"Like the _Corsair_?"

"No, not the _Corsair_ , as you know battleship class Balmera crystals are pretty rare. Thus, we've been doing research into ways of replacing them as a power source. The _Corsair_ is actually the first in a new class of ship designed to take advantage of that research. It's actually state of the art." He said worriedly. In the back of his mind, all he could picture was Pidge slipping and falling from her perch. "Miss Holt, if you wouldn't mind. Could you please tell me again why you're currently sitting on top of a giant robot lion? Can't you just perform your diagnostic from down here, on the ground?"

"I already told you, since I can't get in the cockpit I have to access the lion's technical systems from here. What are you worried about? You afraid I'm gonna fall or something?" she asked, sarcastically.

"Honestly Miss Holt, yes. I'd rather not go down in history as the Captain who let one of the Voltron Paladin's fall to her death."

"Well, if you're worried so much, I promise if I fall I'll aim for one of your soldiers on the way down to help break my fall. You certainly have enough of them to spare." Pidge said as she looked around at dozens of soldiers patrolling the hanger bay floor. They looked like ants marching amongst the countless craft stored in the massive hanger.

"The Duchess wants this place to secured that means double the standard guard, especially in here. We wouldn't the Galra Empire getting their hands on this now, would we?"

"Why, it's not like they'd be able to do anything with it. For some reason, I can't seem to find out what's wrong with this thing. Something seems to be suppressing the systems, almost like its being by strangled." Pidge said perplexed. No matter how hard she tried she couldn't figure out what in God's name was going on.

"How can you strangle a giant mechanical lion?"

"Maybe strangle was the wrong word, more like it's being, poisoned," Pidge said, pausing ever so slightly before speaking the final word. "That's it, I can't believe I didn't see sooner. The castle of lions uses the same energy to generate wormholes that the lions use as power. If the blast that destabilized the wormhole during our escape was able to destabilize and corrupt the wormhole it might have a similar effect on the lions themselves. If my lion absorbed enough of that energy when I got ripped out of the hanger bay, it might have corrupted the system. Yes, that's it! That means all I have to do is flush the corrupted energy from the system, and it'll be completely fixed!"

"Okay, so how do you that?" Sun asked, obviously confused. In fact, the young captain had been lost for a while now. The young captain had never really been all that well versed in the more technical aspects of space travel, and the rapid way in which Pidge spoke didn't help much either.

"I have absolutely no idea!" Pidge shouted, her words echoing throughout the hanger. It was actually so loud she'd drawn the attention of a few of the patrolling soldiers. Feeling defeated the young Paladin slumped over and began to glare up at the ceiling.

"Well, I'm afraid you'll have to worry about this later Miss Holt. I believe it's high time you get some rest; you have a busy day tomorrow." Sun said in a manner Pidge found surprisingly similar to that of her friend Shiro.

"What are you, my babysitter? I'm fine, I'll just sleep when I'm done."

"You've been at this for hours now, Miss Holt, you need rest. Especially, since you're hosting the Gala tomorrow."

"I'm a Paladin of Voltron, I've fought off whole fleets of Galra ships before. I'm pretty sure I can host a party while a little sleep deprived." She said chuckling as she did so.

"Trust me, fighting the Galra is nothing compared to one the Duchess's parties," Sun said. At first, Pidge thought this was a joke, but then she remembered the what he'd said back on the ship about the last party he'd been to. The thought of being attacked by a pair of homicidal waiters actually spooked the young Paladin quite a bit. Combine that with the conversation she'd had with Amy about how Galra assassins were coming to kill her, and she was starting to think it was a good idea to get a little extra sleep. Conceding, she stepped off her lion's head before activating her jetpack and safely floating to the ground. Once there, she followed Sun out of the hanger bay and started the long walk back to her quarters. The whole time her mind was racing about not only her lion but her friends, her family, her mission everything. It was a lot for a fourteen-year-old girl to handle. Unfortunately, she didn't have much of a choose. She was a Voltron Paladin and whether she liked it or not that fact was going to shape the rest of her life.

...

As Sun made his way down the dark hallway he couldn't help but notice the sound of footsteps following him as he went. They weren't loud footsteps; in fact, they were so quite most people would never have never even noticed them. Especially since Sun's own footsteps were echoing off the wall. But Sun wasn't most people. He'd noticed the tale hours ago, a few minutes after he'd left his room. It was actually the reasons he was wandering around the massive estate in the middle of night. He wanted to make sure he wasn't just being paranoid and that he was, in fact, being followed. Of course, that wasn't his initial reason for leaving his room. The young Captain had always had trouble sleeping in unfamiliar places and while he'd known the Duchess for quite some time, he'd never spent the night at her estate before. So, he'd decided to go for a walk to help calm his nerves and, oddly enough, it had actually worked. His tail was closing now; they couldn't have been more than a few yards behind him now. Time to act. In one fluid motion, Sun drew his pistol, spun around, and fired three times in rapid secession. That's when he saw him, a tall hooded figure lurking in the shadows. His first shot went wide. The second hit the man square in the shoulder. And his final round took his head clean off. The body hadn't even hit the ground before Sun realized what was going on. The young captain tried to turn around but it was too late. He'd been tricked. Suddenly, another figure leaped from the shadows, knocked away his gun, wrapped its hands around Sun's neck, and tackled him to the floor. Sun started thrashing and kicking wildly, trying to get his attacker off of him. But it wasn't working. That's when he saw it. A knife on the assassin's belt. Without hesitation, Sun ripped the weapon from its sheath and jabbed the blade between its owner's ribs. Then he kicked the stunned assassin off of him before jumping to his feet. Unfortunately, the assassin wasn't too far behind. He tore the knife out from between his own ribs and lunged at Sun, swinging wildly at his head. He managed to slash Sun across the cheek before the captain grabbed him by the wrist. The pair then began to wrestle over the knife. Trying to gain the upper hand Sun slammed his fist into the assassin's stomach. Stunned and breathless he dropped the knife allowing Sun to gain a hold of it. A split second later he buried the knife in the man's kneecap crippling him. Unfortunately, the poor bastard barely had time to scream before Sun grabbed his head and slammed it against the wall causing crimson blood to be splattered across the polished marble. Sun slumped over exhausted. Unfortunately, he couldn't relax. The next thing he knew someone was rushing down the hall towards him. Quickly he snatched his pistol off the ground and leveled it at the newcomers. He almost fired, but luckily before he did he realized the people rushing towards him were members of his crew, part of the group he'd brought to patrol the estate. He'd have to have a conversation with them about this later but for now, he was just happy to see them.

"Are you okay Captain? We heard the shots and came running as fast as we could. What happened?" They asked as they ran up to him, their blaster rifles pointed at the now lifeless corpse.

"I'm fine, just decided to go for a little midnight stroll is all." He said holstering his sidearm. "I want this body out of here now, and no matter what, do not tell anyone about this. Especially not Miss Holt."

"Aye Captain we'll get on it right away. Permission to speak sir?"

"Go ahead."

"I just like to say we're sorry about this, Captain. I don't know how this Galra scum got past us." He said as he watched Sun remove the assassin's mask.

"You didn't."

"Excuse me, sir?"

"You didn't let this Galra scum sneak past you,"

"What do mean sir?" he asked, utterly confused.

"Our friend isn't Galra scum," Sun replied as he stared into the assassin's cold, blue eyes.

 **Author's Note: I would like to take a moment and thank jim1195 for all his help editing these first few chapters. Some of you may have noticed that the numerous spelling and grammar mistakes that once plagued this story have been removed. This is due in no small part to jim1195 and all of his help. He will be helping me edit my work from now on so that I can avoid a lot of the more embarrassing errors I've been known to make. I strongly suggest you go check out his Star Wars story entitled _Marczak_ over on his profile. **


	5. Chapter 5

Pidge franticly tapped her foot as she examined herself in the mirror. Her hair was done up in an ornate style that managed to worked several small emeralds into her light brown locks. The gems perfectly matched the ones laced into her gown, they even sparkled in same way, casting small dots of green light on her surroundings. It was almost like her green dress glowed; all in all, she actually looked rather elegant. Unfortunately, she didn't feel very elegant, she actually felt like she was going to throw up. A feeling that was perfectly represented by the look on her face.

"How the hell am I gonna do this?" she asked as she pressed her forehead against the mirror in front of her.

"Hopefully, without throwing up." Pidge spun around to see Amy standing in the doorway done up in a similar outfit.

"Hey, Amy," Pidge said, her head still pressed up against the mirror. "Don't worry, I'll be fine. I just need a minute."

"Now why don't I believe that dear?" she asked, placing her hand on the young girl's shoulder.

"Probably because I don't believe it. I'm scared out of my damn mind. A few months ago I was at the Garrison Academy, now I'm supposed to be some kind of space diplomat. I have no idea what I'm doing. What if I mess up and make things worse?" she asked, starting to panic.

"How could you possibly make things worse?"

"What if I knock over a tray onto some guy and he freaks out, and next thing I know you and the Galra are holding hands as you destroy me, my friends, earth and everything I've ever known."

"Trust me, it'll take a lot more than a knocked over tray to get us and the Galra to hold hands." Amy said, chuckling.

"Okay, so maybe I'm exaggerating, but it could still go badly. Like really, really, badly."

"You'll be fine, trust me. We've got your back no matter what."

"I'd still feel a lot better if Sun was there with us." She wasn't quite sure why, but for some reason she felt safer whenever the young Captain was nearby.

"I'm sure Sun feels the same way, Lady Holt. If there's one thing I've learned about Sun, it's that he'd do anything to protect his friends."

"Then why isn't he here?" she asked, finally turning to face Amy.

"Because, like he said, Sun's busy organizing the defenses to make sure no one can get in here. That, and he knows that you'll be safest with me in the ball room."  
"Yeah, a room filled with scores of random people I don't know, that's totally safe."

"Scores of random, Galra hating nobles, most of whom are armed. That and you'll also have me there to watch your back. Trust me, Sun's in more danger then you are right now."

"Fine, but I wish I could at least talk to him." Something about being cut off from her new friend only served to further remind her of how far away she was from home.

"Well I might actually be able to help you with that." The Duchess said as she held up an ornate golden necklace.

"What's that?" Pidge asked, clearly confused.

"It's a communication collar, just like the ones Sun and his men use, only a lot more expensive. This should allow you to communicate with Sun during the Gala. Just tap it and it'll open a secure channel between you and Sun."

"Thank you." Pidge said as Amy placed the communicator around the young Paladin's neck.

"Why don't you try it out?" Amy asked, a smile plastered across her face. With that Pidge lightly tapped the necklace and, sure enough, Sun's voice soon rang out from the device's hidden speakers.

"Hello Miss Holt, I see the Duchess gave you the collar like I suggested, is everything alright, do you need my assistance?" he said, his voice instantly boosting her confidence.

"Everything's fine Sun, I'm just checking in. How's everything on your end?" she asked, starting to smile.

"We're all fine on our end. There's no way in hell a Galra assassin's getting in here. There's no need for you to worry, I've got your back, no matter what."

"Yeah, same here." She said, finally smiling. "Good luck Sun."

"Good luck Miss Holt, I'll see you one the other side."

"I'll see you on the other side." She said, her confidence finally returning. With that she followed Amy out the door and followed her down the hall towards the massive ball room fully decorated for the Gala that was about to begin.

...

Pidge nervously rocked back and forth as a large man in a fancy suit made his way down the long hall way towards her.

"Greetings your Lordship, It's good to see you again." Amy said as the final guest reached the entrance were she and Pidge where waiting to greet him. The pair quickly exchanged pleasantries with the man before motioning him into the massive ballroom where the rest of the guests where already enjoying themselves. As he melted away into the crowd of people Pidge let out a small sigh of relief. She'd greeted each and every guest on Amy's list, and so far, nothing had gone wrong. Unfortunately, she wasn't out of the woods yet. The most dangerous part of the evening was still ahead of her, mingling with the guests, a task she felt woefully unprepared for. She reached towards her necklace, desperate to hear Sun's voice. He always seemed so calm and collected, it actually reminded her of Shiro, or her father. Maybe that's way she trusted him so much, he reminded her of her family, both of her families. Unfortunately, Amy stopped her before she could activate the communicator.

"I just want to talk to him"

"You've spoken to him six times already; I know he said you could call him anytime but he does have a job to do. You know that whole thing where he's trying to keep you alive. Stopping assassin's, protecting your lion, patrolling the grounds any of this ringing a bell?" she asked sarcastically.

"I know, it's just, I'm nervous, and…"

"I know you are, but trust me, while Sun might be good in a fire fight, parties are not his forte. I'm actually starting to feel offended, two days of helping you prepare and you think he can give you better advice then me?" she asked, once again joking in an attempt to lighten the mood.

"No, it's just, he reminds me of team and I've never had to do anything like this without them. They've always had my back, no matter what, and now…"

"Their gone and you don't know what to do?"

Now Pidge was starting freak out, the fact that Amy could guess what she was thinking so easily was starting to scare her.

"How do you know that?" she asked suspiciously.

"I felt the same way when I lost my fiancé, and, like you, I clung to whatever reminded me of him hoping he'd be there for me just one last time, but that's not what they would have wanted. They'd want us to be strong." She finished as she placed her hand on her young compatriot's shoulder.

"Wow, you really are great at giving advice." She said, chuckling.

"I know right, now come along, we have guests to mingle with." With that, the pair made their way into the crowd of guest to begin Pidge's, hopefully successful, political career.

...

Sun was deeply concerned, not that you would have known by looking at him. His expression was the same as it always was, stern and confident, but it was just a mask. He'd done all he could to insure Miss Holts safety but he still didn't feel confident, especially not after last night. The attack had forced him to change the entire security plan, all because the assassin hadn't been a Galra agent like he expected, but one of the soldiers assigned to the estate. At first Sun had actually been rather happy. He thought he'd found the spy the Duchess had warned him about, but upon further inspection his hopes had been dashed. His attacker had been just some random, low ranking enlisted man; there's no way he could have known the _Corsair_ was heading to Amicus, which meant there was no way he could have tipped off the Galra, which meant he wasn't the spy. That meant Sun didn't have to worry about one traitor, he had to worry about a whole nest of them, some of whom were more than willing to kill their own kind to please their Galra overlords. That meant he couldn't trust any of the normal guards, unfortunately, he didn't have a choice. There weren't enough of his own men there to guard the entire estate, not by themselves anyway. His only option was to mix his men in with the normal security personal and hope that there were enough loyal men in each group to keep the traitors from making a move. Unfortunately, that meant he had to reassign his men from their initial post, the hanger bay, and that left Miss Holt's lion woefully undefended. He could only spare ten of his lancers to guard it, the rest of his men had to patrol the complex to make sure that if the Galra did send a group of their assassins they couldn't infiltrate the estate. Of course this wasn't necessarily a bad thing, in fact it actually made more tactile sense then his initial plan to have his men clustered together. The Galra had no real reason to go to the hanger bay, their target was Miss Holt not her lion. And even if it was, what were they supposed to do with it? Miss Holt had assured them that the Galra didn't want to destroy Voltron, they wanted to steal it, and there's no way they could've done that without someone stopping them. This way there was more troops guarding the only viable targets, Miss Holt and the rest of the guests. Of course none of this made Sun feel any better, in fact it probably made him feel even worse. It all seemed too easy, and that's exactly way he was so worried, this wasn't right, his life wasn't easy. Especially when it came to dealing with the Galra, he'd had to fight tooth and nail his entire life just to survive, there was no way in hell the Universe had suddenly decided to start going easy one him. Something bad was going to happen, and he wasn't going to relax until it did, luckily he wouldn't have to wait very long.

Suddenly his collar began to frantically flash and beep indicating that someone wanted to talk to him.

"This is Sun, what's going on." He said, answering the call.

"Sir, we've lost contact with the men guarding the hanger bay." One of his men replied.

"What do mean we lost contact?"

"They failed to check in, and they haven't responded to any of our attempts to make contact. We think something might be wrong." The voice replied, clearly concerned.

"Aye soldier, I'll meet you there." He said before ending the call. "The rest of you, you're with me" he continued, motioning to small crowd of soldiers surrounding him.

There was an eerie calm in the air as Sun and twelve of his best men were stacked on the hanger bay doors, preparing to breach and clear the massive structure. After a quick countdown, Sun and the rest of his men rushed through the door, blaster rifles at the ready. Once inside the group quickly made their way towards the massive green lion located in the middle of the flight deck, only to find no sign of an intruder. All they did find was their comrades incapacitated on the ground. Unsure of what exactly they'd just walked into, the group continued to clear their surroundings, blasters at the ready. After a few moments, Sun flashed a few hand signals breaking them up into two groups. The first group diverted to their fallen comrades attempting to revive them while the other began to form a perimeter around them. Despite the lack of any clear danger, Sun was still on edge, something about this just didn't seem right. He was about to call for back up when, suddenly, metallic cylinders came flying out of nowhere landing next to sun and his men. Before any of them could react however, massive bolts of purple lightning began to arch between the cylinders electrocuting Sun and his men, until they all finally fell, their screams of pain ending as they hit the ground. Not a second later, three hooded figures emerged, seemingly from out of nowhere, before slowly making their way towards the lion, walking over the bodies of their victims as they went. As the trio slowly approached the vessel, one of them produced a large spike from her sleeve before plunging it into floor. An action which was swiftly duplicated by her two compatriots. When they'd finished a blue triangle began to form in the air around the lion as energy began to course though the metallic creature. As this happened, the lion's eyes once again began to glow as life slowly returned to ancient beast.

...

A loud laugh echoed off the walls of the massive ballroom drawing the attention of several party goers. The source of this laugher, a rather large noble woman, was currently engaged in conversation with Duchess Merlin as Pidge stood there in stunned amazement, hardly contributing to the conversation. She had this bad feeling in the pit of her stomach, like something horrible was happening. Unfortunately, she had absolutely no idea what that something was. She thought about checking in with Sun just to be safe, but she decided against it. Whatever was going on, Sun could probably handle it just fine. Besides, she thought to herself, she'd probably look pretty weird if she just randomly started talking to her necklace, especially now. She was technically involved in a conversation with some noble women, of course she didn't exactly know what the conversation was about. The only thing she'd really said to whole time was her name, other than that it had just been Amy and the women discussing various topics she knew little to nothing about. Speaking of Amy, she'd once again managed to surprise the young paladin. As she listened to the Duchess chat away she found it a little hard to believe this was the same person she'd met two days ago. Her familiar mannerisms and eccentricity where gone, and in their place was a speech pattern more befitting of her status. She was actually rather shocked at how different she seemed, it was almost like looking at a completely different person.

"Don't you agree Lady Holt." Amy asked, catching Pidge completely off guard.

"What was that, Your Grace?" She asked, trying to recover.

"Lady Morgan here was just saying how wonderful the Gala is, don't you agree."

"Oh, why yes. It is rather lovely." Pidge responded, an embarrassed blush beginning to form on her face.

"It really is spectacular, far superior to your last soirée, wouldn't you agree, Your Grace?" Lady Morgan asked before taking another sip of her drink.

"I wouldn't say far superior…"

"Well I would, that little altercation spoiled the whole evening. And the way that commoner killed those two men, barbaric if you ask me."

This is where Pidge started to gain interest in the conversation. It was clear she was talking about the incident with the waiters Sun and Amy where talking about back on the _Corsair_ , a topic she'd been wondering about for quite some time now. She was also confused as to way Lady Morgan sounded so spiteful when she referred to him as a commoner.

"I can't say I blame him though," Morgan continued "it was bound to happen. I'm afraid commoners are just too volatile to take part in such events, especially one with such a violent reputation."

"What do you mean?" Pidge asked.

"Lady Morgan simply means that a few of the stories concerning Captain Vac are a bit grim." Amy said, interrupting.

"Grim is a bit of understatement if you ask me. I mean no offense by it, Your Grace, I'm sure you had your reasons for hiring him."

"Indeed I did Lady Morgan, indeed I did. Captain Vac may not be the most… well liked officer, but his strategic skill more than makes up for it." Amy continued, her voice carrying a slight hint of malice. A hint Lady Morgan obviously didn't pick up on.

"Indeed. Besides, I'm sure strategy isn't the only area he's skilled in." She said, winking.

Pidge was debating the meaning of that gesture when she heard a slight crackling sound coming from her necklace, almost like static. She activated the communicator attempting to raise Sun, but nothing happened, even the faint static had stopped. Now she was concerned, she turned to the two nobles and excused herself, saying she was going to check on something and she'd return momentarily. Before she could slip away however, she was stopped my Amy.

"You're going to check on Sun aren't you?" she whispered.

"Somethings not right, I can feel it. I promise it won't take long it's just…"

"I'm not trying to stop you, I just wanted to tell you to be careful." She said, handing over her Bayard, surprising the young Paladin. She hadn't been able to carry the weapon with her due to her rather impractical outfit and she certainly wasn't expecting Amy to be carrying it, mostly because they were basically wearing the same thing.

"Thank you." She said taking her weapon.

...

Sun's muscles screamed in agony as he slowly regained consciousness, moaning softly as he attempted to sit up. A course of action he quickly abandoned due to a combination of pain and fear. He decided he should take a few moments to try and figure out exactly what was going on before he decided to stand up and make himself a target. A decision he made after realizing he was currently surrounded by what appeared to be the bodies of his men, needless to say, it wasn't an encouraging sight. The last thing he remembered was, he was going to clear the hanger bay, they found his men incapacitated and then, they were ambushed! Now he remembered, he'd been taken out by some kind of grenade maybe. Whatever it was, it hurt like hell.

Okay Sun, he thought to himself, your men are either dead or unconscious, which means you're not gonna have back up.

He slowly reached to his collar and activated it, nothing.

Must have gotten fried when I got knocked out, he thought. Well looks like you're one your own.

The young Captain looked to his right, an action which resulted in a great deal of pain. That's when he finally saw his attackers. Three figures in black clocks wearing purple, featureless masks, were standing in a triangle around the lion a few yards away.

Great, he thought, Galra assassins. And, apparently, a magic blue triangle? Yeah, I have no idea what that is, so I'm just going to ignore that for now. I need to think of a plan to stop them from doing, whatever it is there doing.

With great effort he turned his head the other way, that's when he saw it, a blaster rifle. Or as he referred to it, his plan. At this point adrenaline was starting to kick in numbing the pain, if only slightly. Using what little strength he had combined with sheer will power he jumped to his feet, grabbed the rifle and took aim at the closest assassin. Then he pulled the trigger only to be answered with a soul crushing click.

"Well, Fu…" began only to be cut off by a swift kick from the assassin he'd attempted to kill. The force of the kick sent him flying backwards into a large supply crate, his impact leaving a dent in the large metallic box. Struggling to stay on his feet, Sun drew his side arm and attempted to fire only to be met with the same result as before. Out of options Sun threw his useless weapons at the rapidly approaching assassin, an effort that proved to be rather pointless. Having failed to stop the assassin's advance Sun dove out of the way just in time to avoid being stabbed in the chest. At this point he assassin had drawn her sword as was attempting to use it to decapitate the young Captain. An outcome he desperately tried to avoid as he dodged her rapid swings and slashes. After a few seconds of this, Sun finally managed to roll past the Galra, narrowly avoiding one of her attacks. Seeing his opportunity, Sun drew the knife from his belt and lunged at the assassin's back. Unfortunately, before he could land a blow the assassin spun around deflecting his attack with her sword before producing a knife of her own and slashing Sun across his right shoulder. After that Sun backed away a bit, desperately searching for an opening, but finding nothing. Sure, he knew how to win a knife fight but this assassin was leagues better than he was, and he knew. He'd have a hard enough time beating her normally, let alone after absorbing a near fatal dose of electricity. He thought for a second about ditching this fight and making a mad dash for the other assassins who, at this point, hadn't joined in on the fight. Maybe he couldn't kill them, but he might be able to stop or at least delay whatever they were up to. After about a second, he decided against it and instead turned his focus back towards the assassin in front of him. He lunged at her, stabbing and slashing at her neck, but none of his attacks managed to connect. They were all either dodged or blocked. Eventually he took a stab at her head only to miss entirely and nearly lost his footing. That's when the assassin swung her knife at his neck, luckily, sun managed to block it with his arm guard. After that the assassin went on the offense again, violently slashing at him with both her blades. Sun retreat blocking as best he could, managing to deflect most of her attacks, unfortunately he couldn't stop them all. With one swing of her sword, she knocked aside Sun's knife and slashed him across the face. This caused Sun to lower his guard as he screamed in pain, allowing the assassin to slash him across the face before kicking him in the stomach, causing him to fall flat on his back. He tried to get up only to have the assassin stab in the side with the tip of her sword. He clutched his side as he desperately tried to prop himself up, refusing to admit defeat even in the face of certain death. The assassin, unimpressed with his display of determination, raised her sword preparing to behead the young captain. Before she could deliver the final blow however, a grappling hook came flying out of nowhere, wrapping itself around her neck. Within seconds, the assassin collapsed on the ground as thousands of volts of electricity went coursing through her body. After staring at the motionless assassin for a few seconds, Sun looked up to see Pidge clutching her Bayard, the end of which had just finished retracting. The young Paladin's gown appeared to have been torn and cut in several places to allow for greater movement, and her hair was no longer done up in a fancy style. The look of rage in her eyes was so intense that it actually scared Sun, a task few have every been able to accomplish.

"HEY!" she screamed at the top of her lungs "Step away from the lion and leave him alone, before I come over there and literally murder all of you!"

Apparently, they didn't take her threat all to seriously, because amicably after she finished the two remaining assassin's drew their swords and rushed straight towards the young paladin. Once they'd closed on their target they both swung, attempting to take her head off only to have her slide under both their swings, slashing one of them across the calve as she went. Then she jumped to her feat ready to fight. The assassin she hadn't wounded lunged at her franticly swiping at her only to hit nothing but air. His wounded compatriot was about to join in on the attack, when he was suddenly blindsided by Sun. The young captain, through adrenaline and sheer will power, had made it back onto his feat, grabbed the down Galra's sword, and was now using it to attack her wounded comrade. As Son continued to hack away at the wounded assassin, attempting to find an opening in his defense, Pidge continued on with her battle. She was managing to dodge every attack the assassin threw at her, though she hadn't found an opportunity to launch an attack of her own. That was, until he took a swing at her shoulder only to miss entirely. Seizing the opportunity, Pidge grabbed the man by the wrist and pulled him towards her, slamming the Bayard into his stomach before tasing him. The poor bastard screamed in pain before collapsing to the ground, completely incapacitated. She then looked over to see Sun still locked in combat with the other assassin. Wishing to help her friend she shot her grappling hook into a panel on the wall and ripped it out sending it flying towards them.

"Sun look out!" she screamed.

The young Captain looked over his shoulder before ducking just in time to avoid the flying hunk of metal. The assassin however was not so lucky, the metal panel slammed him in the face, disorienting him. Taking the opportunity to finish off his opponent, Sun lunged forward driving the sword clean through the assassin's chest, then as he fell to his knees, Sun used his knife to slit the man's throat allowing his lifeless corpse to crumple to the ground. With their enemies defeated Pidge turned her attention towards her wounded friends.

"Sun are you okay?" She asked, in shock at the sight of her friend bloody and beaten.

He looked like something hell had spat back up. His armor was charred, face and side bleeding, and he swayed back and forth as he desperately struggled to remain standing.

"I'm fine… _cough cough_ … Miss Holt." He lied, wiping blood from the corners of his mouth. "No need to worry" he continued, the blood soaked knife falling from his hand. "You have a party you need to get back to." He said, slurring his words. "I'll be fine, I just, need, sle…" was the last thing he managed to say before closing his eyes and collapsing. Panicking, Pidge rushed over to her fallen comrade shouting his name as tears began to form in her eyes.

"Come on Sun, stay with me." She began as she cradled him in her arms, tears streaming down her face. "Stay with me Sun. Please don't leave me. Please. Not again. Please don't. Please don't leave. Come on. Come on Sun. Don't leave. Stay. Stay with me please. Please stay with me. Don't leave me. I don't want to be alone again; I don't want to be alone."


	6. Chapter 6

Footsteps echoed off the walls of the narrow hallway as Duchess Merlin slowly made her way towards one of the lower levels of her estate. Few people ever came to this level of the estate, in fact, most of the servants and staff where prohibited from this level, and for good reason. As a Duchess, she often found herself in need of a secure location where she could discuss things of a sensitive nature. In fact, this was just such an occasion, what she was about to do was best done in private, away from judgmental

As Amy came to the end of the hallway, she entered a large room, half of which was blocked off by a transparent blue wall. Besides the Duchess, there where three other people in the room, two of her lancers, both of whom were standing at attention in front of the wall, locked at attention and the only a small beaten figure locked into a chair which itself was locked to the floor. The third figure, the only surviving member of the group who'd had the audacity to infiltrate her estate, was on the other side of the blue wall as Amy and her men, that was until Amy pressed a small button on the gauntlet of her armor at which point the wall slowly faded from existence, leaving nothing to protect the bloody and bruised figure from the visible furious Duchess.

"You two are free to go." She said as she approached the prisoner. Without hesitation the two guards silently exited the room, leaving their superior to do her work.

"So, my men told me you still haven't talked." She said as she crouched down in order to look her prisoner in the eye. "I'll give you credit, I didn't expect you to last this long, most people don't make it past a few hours, but a full day. I'm impressed, unfortunately, I'm afraid that won't quite be enough. You see, your little attack has left me with a lot of questions, how'd you get past my men, what where you doing with the lion, what was your actual target." She said as she began to circle the seated figure.

"I'll die before I tell you anything you Lincar scum." The prisoner said, his voice little more than a whisper.

"Yeah, and why's that?" Amy asked, from her position behind her prey.

"Because, unlike you I have something to fight for, honor and glory." He replied, smirking.

"Really, sneaking around and stabbing people in the back, that's honorable? I'd hate to see what you people consider despicable." She finished chuckling.

"What I do, I do for the glory of the Galra empire…"

"And only victory or death will stop you. I know, I know I've heard it a thousand times. News flash buddy, you're not dead and you certainly didn't win."

"That's what you think. As long as you're here wasting your time, I've won."

"Wow, you people have seriously low standards. Well, I guess I should've known that by now, I mean they sent you didn't they?"

"Are insults and jokes all you have witch? You'll have to do better than that to break me."

"Oh, don't worry I'm about to hurt you, rather badly I might add, but first I'd like to tell you something."

"They told me about you, she demon. The poor miserable Duchess who lost her favorite man wh..." Suddenly, Amy struck the man across the face.

"You don't get to speak!" she yelled shaking the pain from her hand. Before she continued, she once again came face to face with her prisoner, as she did so she parted the hair from the right side of her face, revealing her secrete. The whole ride side of her face was burned and scared, even her eye mangled, the whole thing was a pale milky white, a visual sign of how useless it was. "Do you want to know why I'm so good at getting information out of people like you? It's because I was raised with the philosophy that if someone wrongs you, you take your revenge in kind, and you people have wronged me many, many times. First, you take my eye, then you killed my fiancé, and now, you almost murdered one of the only people in this pathetic galaxy I actually care about. That's not even taking into consideration the countless friends of mine you monsters have killed over the years, but we'll have time for all that later." Amy said, standing as she removed a small knife from her belt. "For now, let's just start at the bottom and work our way up from there, which means," she said, pressing the tip of her against the man's temple, "you owe me an eye." And with that the blue wall rematerialized itself, just in time to muffle the screams.

...

Pidge drummed a crude beat against the floor as she sat cross legged on the ground, staring wide eyed at the glass tube that currently contained her friend.

"Why hasn't he woken up yet?" she asked addressing the nurse that was currently monitoring his vitals, her voice a mixture of impatience and concern.

"Like I already told you Miss Holt," She replied after sighing, "It's going to take a few days for him to fully recover. But I'm sure you're going to ask me again in a few ticks."

"What?"

"Nothing Miss Holt, I'm more than happy to answer any questions you may have, even if they're all the same one." She said before leaving to monitor another patient, just one of many wounded crew members currently being treated in the Corsair's medical bay.

"Well why is this taking so long?"

"Because, it's a healing pod not a miracle machine." Suddenly a familiar voice called out from behind answering the young paladin, "It's going to take a while to patch him up, especially after the beating he took." Amy said as she entered the medical bay flanked by two of her Lancers.

"Hey, I thought you had an important meeting today?" she asked as she stood to greet the Duchess.

"I did, but it ended earlier so I decided to stop by and see how you were doing, I figured it was a good idea to check in with you before you shipped out. So how are you doing today Miss Holt?"

"I'm fine, everything's fine." She replied, clearly lying.

"Are you sure, you seem upset?" Amy said, she knew what was really eating at he but she figured it was best to let her admit it.

"It's nothing, it's just… I'm worried about Sun. When Lance got hurt, we weren't sure if he was going to be okay or not and it didn't take this long for him to wake up. After seeing Sun hurt like that, and with how long it's taking for him to wake up, I'm just worried. What if he never wakes up? What if he…" She said as her eyes began to water.

"Don't worry," Amy began, placing her hand on the young girl's shoulder in an attempt to calm her nerves. "He's a warrior, he'll make it through this, trust me." Pidge still didn't seem convinced, and she really couldn't blame her either. Honestly, she was pretty worried about him too. He'd sustained a concussion, two broken ribs, a near fatal dose of electricity, and most of his blood was still smeared all over the hanger bay floor. Needless to say, he wasn't in very good shape. Not to mention the fact that he now had a long, jagged scar running from his left cheek all the way up to his right temple.

At least now he doesn't have to try so hard to intimidate people, she thought to herself, desperately searching for some kind of bright side to all this. Though, for some reason she figured a clever comment about Sun's new look wasn't what her young friend needed to hear right now, so she decided to change the subject.

"As much as I hate to say this, maybe it's for the best, him not being awake." She said, looking over at numerous other pods filled with Sun's crew. "it would have torn him up see his crew like this, though he'd be happy you made it out okay."

"He really does care about them" Pidge said, glancing over at Sun's wounded comrades. She knew what that was like, even now she was worried about her friends, not to mention her actually family.

"Of course he does, they're some of the only people he really cares about."

"What do you mean?"

"Sun probably hasn't told you yet, he never did like talking about his past. You see, Sun's an orphan, he doesn't even know what his parents' names where, as far as he's concerned his crews the only family he's ever had. That's probably why he kept most of the staff he had from his first ship, and why he fought so hard in the hanger bay, he considers you to be part of his crew now."

Pidge wasn't sure how she was supposed to fill about all this. Sure she'd lost her family to Zarkon, but at least she'd had one to begin with. The thought of Sun growing up alone only made her feel worse then she already did.

"Not that you were in any real danger, well at least not until you decided to go charging in to protect Sun. Thank you for that by the way." She said smiling.

"What are talking about?" she asked, clearly confused.

"Well, you see I had a little 'chat' with the prisoner you managed to capture and he told me about the plan you managed to derail."

"What he say?"

"Quite a lot actually, he didn't know everything, but he was able to shine a light on a few of the more confusing parts of this whole ordeal. For starters, he told me why they sent one of their inside agents to kill Sun…"

"Wait," Pidge interrupted. "When did someone try and assassinate Sun?"

"Oh yeah, I forgot we didn't tell you about that. Sorry about that, but, in my defense it was Sun's idea, he didn't want to worry you. Anyway, apparently the whole thing was some kind of diversion, a way to scare Sun into spread his own forces too thin so they could just sneak on in without anyone noticing. And apparently it worked perfectly"

"If that's true then why am I still breathing?"

"Because, you weren't the target, my dear." She said, gesturing towards her unconscious friend. "Their mission was to try and capture your lion."

"How where they planning on doing that?"

"I'm not a hundred percent sure what their plan for that one was, like I said our new friend was privy to every detail of the mission, Galra agents rarely are. All I know is that apparently that women that attacked Sun was actually a druid, and that she was the one in charge of running the device they brought with them. Unfortunately, the damn thing broke as soon as you killed that crazy bitch so I'm afraid we're still not entirely sure what they did to your lion so, you'll have to run a diagnostic on it once it's been loaded into the ship's hanger. I'd have the crew do it but they don't know what to look for." With that she turned to face her young companion hoping to find her exuberant, she always seemed so happy when she got to work on her lion, but not this time. It was clear Pidge wasn't paying attention to a word she was saying, instead she was staring at Sun gently placing her hand against his healing pod as tears began to form in her eyes.

Amy had been a soldier long enough to realize what was going through the young Paladin's mind right now. She was worried about Sun, and worse she was starting to blame herself for what happened. She'd been through the same thing enough times to know exactly what was running through her head. She was starting to second guess herself, to wonder what she could have done differently to keep him from getting hurt. Her speech hadn't cheered her up at all, in fact it had only made things worse. She needed a way to make Pidge feel better, and fast, otherwise she'd break under the pressure, just like when she'd first lost her beloved. That meant there was only one thing she could do to help Pidge keep it together.

She leaned down and hugged the young paladin, pulling her close and kissing her on the top of her head, the way her mother had done too her when she was a child.

"It's okay my dear, it's all going to be okay. He's going to be fine, I promise." She said, her eyes beginning to water. "I'm here, I'm here, it's okay. It's all going to be okay."

"I know," Pidge began, fighting back tears. "I know, it's just. I've lost so much already; I don't want to lose anyone else." And with that they both began to cry. No fighting, no death, no war, just two people worried about their friend.

...

Pidge slowly made her way towards the bridge, clutching her helmet in her hand. It'd been a day since they left Amicus and she was finally starting to feel well enough to wander around the ship again. She figured it wouldn't do anyone any good if she just sat there for three days straight, staring at a tube, especially not while there was exploring to be done. Unfortunately, she wasn't exactly in a very explorative mood today, so she decided to simply head to the bridge and see how everyone was doing, especially Shrike. She also figured she'd finally get to see how the commander was doing. She hadn't seen the Shrike since their hectic engagement with a suicidal Galra battleship, an engagement which resulted in the young commander being carried off the bridge on a stretcher. Sure she'd been meaning to visit her earlier, but she hadn't had the time, she just kind of assumed she was okay. Apparently, it was a fair assumption, seeing as Shrike had apparently been in command the whole time Sun was planet side helping organize, but she still felt bad.

"Hello, every…." Pidge suddenly froze as she entered the bridge. Something about the bridge just seemed wrong, and it wasn't just the fact that Sun was missing. It was almost as if there was a tangible sense of depression amongst the officers. All except for commander Shrike, it almost seemed as if she was furious for some reason, it actually scared her a little.

"Hello, Miss Holt." Shrike said, a hint of detest in her voice. "I didn't expect to see you today, I figured you'd be in the medical bay waiting for the Captain to wake up."

"I decided just sitting around waiting for something to happen wasn't doing anybody any good, so I figured I'd just check in, see how things were going." She awkwardly replied.

"I'm glad that we can serve as a source of temporary amusement for you Miss Holt, that is why we're hear." Shrike said, gritting her teeth.

Pidge debated whether or not she should ask Shrike what exactly had her so pissed off. Whatever was going on, she didn't want to make it any worse, and she really didn't want all that anger directed at her, if it wasn't already. Eventually, she figured it was a probably a good idea to at least try and calm down the women who was currently in command of a massive floating death machine.

"Are you okay?" she asked as she approached the command platform. "You seem to be upset about something."

"I'm not upset." She replied as she intensified her glare.

"Are you sure, I'm right here if you want to talk about it, I know that always makes me feel better."

"I'm not you." She replied, as she began to run her fingers through her hair moments before she lowered her eyes and began to mumble to herself. Pidge couldn't hear exactly what she was saying, but she did manage to pick out Sun's name a few times. She decided that if she was going to find out what was going on, she'd have to talk to the other members of the bridge staff, so she went over to Ensign Caz's station and leaned over his shoulder so she could talk to him without anyone else hearing their conversation. Hopefully he knew why his commander was so pissed.

"Hey Caz, can we talk?" he didn't respond. "What's going, how come you're not talking me?"

"Because," he whispered out of the corner of his mouth. "I'm not supposed to."

"Why not?" she whispered, trying as hard as possible to appear as if she wasn't speaking.

"Shrike ordered silence on the bridge unless absolutely necessary."

"But why?"

"Because, she is seriously pissed off; I mean she's normally kind of bitch but she's never been this bad. What happened to the Captain really got to her."

"Where her and Sun really that close?" She asked genuinely surprised, she'd only known the two of them for a few days, but neither of them seemed to be too fond of each other.

"Not really, honestly she could hardly stand him, but I think that's actually what's got her so worked up."

"What do you mean?"

"You see, Shrike was assigned to this ship as a punishment for insubordination, that's the story anyway."

"Why was that her punishment?"

"You see, since she's a noble, being put in a position where she'd be directly subordinate to a commoner is considered a personal insult."

"Was she upset?"

"Upset doesn't even begin to describe how bad she was. She basically spent her whole first week aboard screaming at us, at least until Sun ordered her to stop."

"If serving under him was such an insult, why'd she follows his orders like that?"

"Beats me, if I had to guess, it's probably because Sun's the only reason she's not stuck on some hellish ice ball living out the rest of her life in misery."

"What do you mean?"

"If he'd really wanted to he could've had Duchess Merlin reassign her to some crap hole in the middle of nowhere, but, for whatever reason, Sun saw fit to keep her around."

"But why?"

Suddenly Shrike's voice interrupted the pairs whispered conversation, causing both of them to jump ever so slightly.

"Miss Holt, if you're going to purposely undermine my authority I'll have to ask you to leave the Bridge!" she screamed.

Not wanting to incur any more of her wrath, the young Paladin quickly fled the bridge, but she couldn't help wondering, just why did Sun keep Shrike around. He didn't seem like the kind of person who'd let someone he didn't approve of be first mate aboard his ship, especially if he could get rid of them so easily. It seemed like the more she learned, the less she understood.

Pidge snored loudly, shifting ever so slightly as she slept, curled up beside Sun's healing Pod, patiently waiting for her friend to finally awake. Suddenly, the doors to the med bay slid open, revealing Commander Shrike silhouetted by the light pouring in from the hallway. She then began to slowly creep her way into the room, careful not to wake the young Paladin asleep on the floor. After silently making her way over to her commander's healing Pod, there she slowly reached up and pressed her hand against the glass, sighing as she did so. She examined the young captain's face, examining each and every little detail. Every scare, every scratch, every burn, all signs of just how hard he had to fight to get to where he was, a stark contrast to her own experience.

"It's actually kind of funny," she whispered, "you always said the only way I'd ever command this ship is if you were on your death bed, problem is, I'm not really sure if I can count this as you being wrong." She said, quietly chuckling to herself. She continued to simply stand there and glare at her unconscious Shipmaster for a few moments before finally letting out a sorrowful sigh as she began to run her hands through her hair.

"I've been thinking about what you said, when I first came aboard. How you said you could help me finally become an officer worthy of my commission." She then paused for a few moments, unsure of what to say. "I hope you know, I don't actually hate you. No matter how I act, no matter how much of a bitch I am, I don't hate you. You're the only person I've ever met who didn't immediately write me off because of him, probably because you know what it's like to be judged for something you can't control. Hell, compared to you my life's been a cake walk, and yet, you still felt sorry for me, you still cared about me. You didn't just dump me off on someone else, you actually tried to help me, and all I do is act like a bitch to you and your men, like father like daughter I guess." She said, chuckling, depression obvious in her voice.

Finished, Shrike slowly turned on her heel and began heading back towards the door. Before leaving, however, she stopped and looked back over her shoulder and made one final confession,

"As much as I hate to say this, I'll help the human, no matter what, I promise. I might not like her but if you trust her, I'll give my life to help her complete her mission, I'll carry her on my back through hell itself if that's what it takes. Not for her, but for you, and to prove to everyone to everyone I'm not a failure, and I'm certainly not my father." And with that, she left.

Author's note: I would just like to thank everyone for all the positive feedback I've gotten so far from all you wonderful people. I'm so happy that I've managed to get 600 views on this story so far and I would like to thank all of you of you for making this possible. You're the ones who make this all worthwhile, thank you. And now that I'm done with all the emotional stuff, time for some shameless self-promotion. Recently I helped a good friend of mine (jim1195) write a story entitled GAR: Brothers in Arms, and it would mean a lot to both of us if you went and checked it out over on his profile.

A few of you will probably have noticed that this chapter changed quite a bit, when I first wrote it I'd had a really bad day and I thought posting something might help me feel better. After a few days of rereading it I decided I didn't like the final product so I decided to change it. I'll try as hard as possible to avoid doing things like this in the future.


	7. Chapter 7

Pidge tugged at the collar of her gown, desperately trying to loosen its vice like grip as the shuttle she was currently seated in made its final decent towards the surface of Altilis. The young paladin was currently on her way towards her next exciting venture into the world of politics, and needless to say, she was pretty nervous. Her only political act up until this point had ended with one of the only friends she had left nearly dying. Even worse, Sun still wasn't back on his feet which meant the only person she had to help her was Commander Shrike and she wasn't exactly the most supportive person in the galaxy. She was still barely spoke to anyone and most of what she did say was hostile, but the commander wasn't being openly spiteful towards her, a fact which Pidge as a win. Of course, she wasn't exactly setting the bar very high lately when it came to what she counted as victories. Honestly, as far as she was concerned the fact that no one had almost died over the past few days was an accomplishment. Of course they really hadn't done anything since they'd left Amicus, most of the time she was ether in the medical bay waiting for Sun to wake up or in the hanger bay checking on her lion. Unfortunately, she wasn't making any progress in either area, Sun was still comatose and she had no idea what that druid had done to her lion. Surprisingly, a few of the beast's systems had actually started to return to working order, she still couldn't fly it of course, but it was a start. Though she hadn't the faintest clue what had cause this, she'd been meaning to investigate the anomaly, but she had a rather important social event to attend to. She was going to a dinner being hosted by Lord Morgan, the husband of the rather overt noble women she'd met at the gala. Apparently, she'd taken a liking to the young paladin, a fact which perplexed Pidge to no end. She'd barley said two words to the lady the hole night, in fact she'd spent most of their conversation simply listening to her ramble on about topics Pidge knew absolutely nothing about. Not to mentation the fact that she'd made several rather hurtful and or lewd comments about her friend, some of which she still didn't quite understand. Sure she'd only know Sun for a little over the week, but she just couldn't understand why anyone would think he was some kind of scoundrel. He wasn't a teddy bear, not by a long shot, but he defiantly wasn't dangerously violent, or maybe he was. She didn't think he was a bad guy, but she hadn't heard any of the "stories" Lady Morgan had been talking about, of course even if she had she wasn't sure how much of it she'd be able to trust. She knew firsthand that stories and accounts where often exaggerated or just plain wrong. Hell, she'd spent the better part of a year listening to people tell her about how Shiro, Matt and her Father had all died on Kerberos, because of some unknown crew error. As far as she knew, Sun was just another victim of exaggeration, and then there was the possibility that he wasn't. If that were true, not that she believed that to be a possibility, it meant her new friend was actually a psychotic killer who just happened to have a charming personality and a trustworthy appearance. Worst of all, she couldn't even confront Sun about his past, not with him being in a coma and all, but she couldn't worry about that now. She had more important things to worry about, she still hadn't figured out what exactly she was planning on saying once she'd reached her destination. She had to make a good first impression, no matter what, especially with Lord Morgan.

According to Amy he was an extremely influential figure, especially when it came to the military. Unfortunately, he very rarely offered his assistance to outsiders, a fact that only added to the young paladin's already ludicrously high stress level. She was actually starting to have second thoughts about this whole endeavor. Maybe this wasn't such a good idea, maybe politics just wasn't her thing, maybe she should just give up.

No, she thought to herself, I can't give up not now.

She was right, she couldn't turn back now, she had a mission and a responsibility to her team, her friends, her family and everyone else she cared about to completely that mission. She had to succeed, she would succeed, no matter what.

Pidge stepped off the ramp, her footsteps echoing as her heels made contact with a large cobble stone block. The first in a long line embedded in the ground leading up to what could only be described as a castle. Thick stone walls, turrets with gargoyles, a massive wooden drawbridge attached to the gate house by huge cast iron chains, the whole thing looked as though it had been lifted strait out of some Arthurian legend and plopped down in the middle of the countryside. The sear sight of it left both Pidge and her bodyguard in a state of stunted awe, they were both at a complete loss for words. Of course her bodyguard had never been much of a conversationalist, in fact, he hadn't said a single thing the whole ride. Pidge wasn't even sure if he could talk. Of course the main evidence for this theory was the long jagged scar across his throat, but she'd have to test that one out later, she had a dinner to attend.

So, she slowly made her way towards the edge of the moat, her guard following close behind. As the pair made their way towards the impressive fortress the mighty drawbridge began to move, the metal chains chattering as the huge hunk of wood was slowly lowered to the ground. Unfortunately, the door wasn't as fast as it was ornate, thus the pair had reached the moat's edge long before the door had even made it the half way point. That meant Pidge and the lancer where stuck waiting impatiently as massive decoration attempted to fulfill its sole purpose. So they waited, and waited, and waited until suddenly the lancer reached forward, grabbing Pidge by the shoulder and pulling her backwards just in time to save her tows from being turned to dust.

"Wow, thanks" Pidge said, turning towards her guard. True to form, the solemn lancer simply nodded before glaring up at the two men manning the gate house, not that they were close enough to notice.

Having narrowly avoided being crippled, Pidge turned her attention towards the crowd of people gathered across the bridge. A tightknit phalanx composed of two dozen men dressed in full knightly attire blocked their entrance into the mighty fortress.

Unsure of how too procced, Pidge simply stood their starring down the crowd of flesh and metal before her, she looked over at the lancer, hoping that he understood what was going on, unfortunately he looked just as confused as she was. Suddenly, the warriors opened ranks revealing a pair of Lincar standing in the middle of the formation, one of whom was franticly waving at the young Paladin.

"Ow, hello Lady Holt, it's great to see you" Lady Morgan said, a massive grin plastered across her face.

"Sorry about the wait, this door really is marvelous but it takes forever to open. It really is quite dreadful, but it just looks so regal, I can't bring myself to get rid of it. Isn't that right darling?" she said, playfully slapping her husband on the shoulder.

Pidge was actually surprised by just how different Lord Morgan was from his wife. He was an older gentleman with a slime frame, silver hair, and a sharp beard that accented his long face. He was wearing jet black riding boots, a pair of crisp blood striped trousers, and a snow white tunic covered in metals and ribbons. Not to mention the fact that he was standing at attention while his wife was practically bouncing in place. All in all, he looked more like a portrait then an actually person, Pidge was actually starting to think he really was a statue until he finally answered his wife.

"Yes." Was he said, his lips barley moving.

"Indeed darling. Now then how was your trip Lady Holt, I hope it pleasant."

"It was fine…"

"Good, you deserve a nice calming experience after what happened at the gala, it really was quite awful what happened. Those Galra ruffians can never just let us enjoy ourselves, always causing problems and killing people. Dreadful, dreadful business. Don't you agree darling." She said, once again slapping him on the shoulder.

"Yes" He said still solemn.

"Well then, let's not dilly dally then. Come along Lady Holt, we have quite the spread laid out." And with that the whole group headed further into the massive fortress towards the great hall. Upon reaching the large building in the middle of the castle's courtyard two of Lord Morgan's "knights" opened the large wooden doors to reveal a long solid oak table dressed in an ornate table cloth. Upon entering the trio quickly took their seats at the far end of the table, with Lord Morgan sitting at the head of the table while Pidge and his wife sat to either side of him, and with that the dinner began.

...

Lady Morgan's voice echoed throughout the massive hall as her two companions occasionally picked at their meals, some type of weird green meat that tasted like some strange mix of steak and chicken, at least that's what Pidge thought it tasted like.

"So, there I was looking around for my purse, flipping over chairs tables, everything, and that's when I realize, I never took it out of my closet." She said before breaking out into a fit of laughter. This was just the latest in a long line of funny anecdotes Lady Morgan had seen fit to share. She'd been rambling on for the better part of an hour now, seemingly unaware of awkward silence that gripped the room.

"So, Lady Holt how's your friend Captain Vac doing? If I remember correctly, he was in a rather bad spot after what happened at the Gala, I do hope he's all right."

"He was hurt rather bad, but I believe he'll be okay." Pidge said, anxious. Even with her limited experience it was clear this wasn't going well and the last thing she needed to be reminded of was her comatose friend.

"I'm glad to hear that, aren't you darling."

"Yes," he said, his voice almost monotone.

"Yes, would you happen to know who's commanding his ship now?"

"Commander Shrike is serving as acting Shipmaster until S… Captain Vac is back on his feet."

"Oh," Lady Morgan replied, a hint of concern in her voice.

"What, is there something wrong with the Commander?"

"No, no its just, Commander Shrike isn't the nicest of individuals. In fact, her whole families rather rotten, especially her father. Rumor has it he's the one who sent those thugs after Captain Sun at Duchess Merlin's party three months ago. A despicable move to put his daughter in command of a capital ship, at least that's story anyway."

Pidge wasn't quite sure how to fell about this, sure Commander Shrike wasn't the nicest individual she'd ever meat but she still wasn't sure how reliable Lady Morgan's rumors really where.

"Now dear," Lord Morgan said interrupting his wife, an action which, based on her reaction, didn't happen very often. "That's not the kind of accusation one just throws around, especially when it involves an officer of the Lincar navy." Every word he said seemed deliberate, almost as if he had a finite supply with which to draw from.

"I know dear, but you have to admit she can't be all too happy aboard that ship. Especially not while serving under Captain Vac, I mean, can you imagine it? Serving under a commoner, it must be so embarrassing."

"From what I understand," Pidge interjected "Captain Vac is a rather talented Naval tactician. In my opinion anyone would be luck to serve under him." She said, perhaps with more bitterness then she originally intended. She didn't mean to be disrespectful, but she didn't like that fact that she was talking bad about her friend behind his back. She may not have known too much about his past, but he'd still saved her life and she certainly wasn't going to let some random noble women talk bad about her.

"I meant no disrespect Lady Holt, its just, I'm not entirely convinced it was a good idea for a commoner to be given command of a capital ship, I don't have anything against them personally it's just traditionally only nobles have been given such prestigious posts and I am a stickler for tradition."

"Well, it's my belief that sometimes traditions need to be broken. From what I've seen of Sun's abilities he's a remarkable Shipmaster and I believe Duchess Merlin would be hard pressed to find someone better suited for the job."

"I'm afraid I can't speak much of Captain Vac's abilities, I never served in the military, I've never really been one for violence, that was always Walter's expertise. Isn't that right darling?"

"Yes, how about you Lady Holt, as a Paladin of Voltron you must have experience when it comes to the art of war." Walter said, it was the first time he'd address Pidge all night.

"Yes, I've taken part in my fair share of battles against Zarkon and his empire." Pidge replied, exaggerating ever so slightly.

"Well then, why don't you share with us a story of one of these engagements? I'm sure they must be rather riveting." Lady Morgan asked, clearly intrigued.

"Well," Pidge awkwardly began "one of the first battles me and my fellow Paladins ever fought against the Galra was at Arus, against Commander Sendak…"

"Sendak." Walter interrupted, his voice full of anger.

"Did I say something wrong?" Pidge asked, confused by the noblemen's sudden outburst of anger, a sharp contrast to the emotionless why in which he'd been behaving. "Are you familiar with Commander Sendak?"

"You see, Walter h…" Lady Morgan began only to be cut off but her husband.

"This is my story Margret; I will be the one to tell." He said as he narrowed his gaze. "During the outset of the last war, my fleet went head to head against a Galra battle group led by a young up start Galra officer named Sendak. I lost a lot of good men that day, it was the only time anyone ever bested me on the field of honor. After that engagement I chanced Sendak from the Dormoon Nebula all the way to the Nodar Expanse until a finally had him cornered at Ray's Belt. That was one of the most intense battles I've ever been in, and in the end, he escaped, but not before taking my legs" he said, as he slowly placed his hand on his metal knee "luckily I managed to take a few things from him as well. But, the fact that he still survived has bothered me to this day."

"Well then, I guess you don't have anything to worry about anymore."

"What do you mean?"

"Me and my friends beat Sendak, twice, once when he tried to destroy the Castle of Lions and one when he tried to steal it for his despicable master. The second time I actually fought him face to face."

"Did you really fight, him one on one."

"I did, though only for a short time. You see, I was the only left to defend the castle after he'd wounded one of my friends with a bomb and lured the rest away by attacking some local villagers."

"That sounds like something that conniving bastard would do, the fact that you were able to beat him is a testament to your skill young Paladin."

"I can't take all the credit, if it wasn't for my friends I probably would have never been able to beat him."

"Well then, these friends of yours really do seem nice." Lady Morgan said, seemingly happy that her husband and Pidge were finally speaking to one another.

"As would I, anyone who's able to defeat a Commander as cunning as Sendak might just have a chance of finally defeating Zarkon."

"So, does that mean the Alliance can count on your support?"

"Perhaps, I believe this matter needs to be discussed in more detail before I make a discussion, but I do have to say, I am impressed by what I've seen so far. I'd love for you to come hunting with me tomorrow so that we can have more time to disuse this matter, that is, if you're not busy."

"I would love to join you, Your Lordship." She replied enthusiastically, she'd actually managed to get a noble to like her, all on her own, well technically it was because she'd help to kill Sendak but still, it'd worked. Almost, she wasn't exactly too thrilled about this whole hunting idea, but if it meant she had Lord Morgan's support she was willing to give it a try. Sure, she'd never been hunting before, but how hard could it possibly be.

"Exultant," He replied, jumping to his feet as he clapped his hands in front of him. "We'll leave first thing in the morning, would you like to house your mount in our stables, the hands will certainly take care of it for you."

"I'm afraid I don't have a mount." Pidge nervously replied, she hadn't expected to find herself in need of a horse, or the closest Lincar equivalent.

"Don't worry, you can borrow Margret's, it's one of the best in the universe"

"No, I wouldn't want to bother you,"

"None sense," Margret said "it's no bother, no bother at all. I wasn't planning on going along anyway. Like I said I've never been much for violence, besides its far too dangerous if you ask me. Honestly Walter, I wish you'd be a little more carful out there. I'm always worried when you go out." She said, her concern evident just by her tone.

"Don't worry love, I survived fifty years in the navy, I'm pretty sure it'll take more than a crash or some beast to kill me." He said before pounding his chest a few times.

"Well then," Lady Morgan began. "it's decided; the hunt shall commence as soon as the sun is in the sky." She finished a massive smile plastered across her face.

"Yes, I'm sure it'll be a wonderful experience for me." Pidge said, attempting to mimic Lady Morgan's level of enthusiasm only to be hampered by her own self-doubts. The way they were talking about this made it seem like this was going to be a lot more dangerous then she'd originally thought. In fact, she was starting to question what she'd just gotten herself into and how the hell she was supposed to get out of it, unfortunately she didn't have a choice. She'd already agreed not to the mention the fact that she really needed Lord Morgan's support. So, if the only way to get it was by doing some kind of crazy space hunt, then God damn it she was going to be the best space hunter the universe had ever seen, even if it killed her.


	8. Chapter 8

"Lieutenant Tar, is everything in working order?" Shrike asked for what must have been the tenth time in the past minute.

"Aye Shipmaster," The Lieutenant said after letting out a muffled groan. "Everything is still in working order, just like the last time you asked me, so just in case you find it necessary to ask me again. The ship is in working order, and as far as I can tell, it will continue to be in working order for the foreseeable future."

"Is that sarcasm Lieutenant?" Shrike asked, her words dripping with venom.

"No Shipmaster, just being proactive, just like Sun always tells us to be." He said, his comment visibly affecting his superior. She'd been struggling over the past couple of days, desperately trying to live up to the expectations set by her incapacitated Captain. He was really the only Shipmaster she'd ever served under, well the only one who actually treated her like a soldier and not just some problem to be dumped and whoever happened to be lower on the food chain. He was the only example she had to go by, unfortunately, Sun wasn't exactly an easy act to follow. He was a good officer, he was loved by his crew, and he always managed to remain calm, three traits she was sorely lacking. Especially, when it came to the crew's opinion of her, of course, that was an issue she'd been struggling with since she'd been assigned to the _Corsair_ , and the worst part was she agreed with them. She didn't deserve her rank, not by a long shot. She'd only graduated from the academy a year ago, she should have been a lieutenant or an ensign, not a Commander. She hadn't even wanted her commission; her father had forced her to take it. Even when she tried to be her own person he always found a way to control her life.

"Shipmaster" Zek called out, snapping her out of her deep self-contemplation "we're got an incoming transmission coming from planetary command."

"Aye lieutenant, patch it through."

"Aye Shipmaster," he responded before pressing a few buttons on his holo-display. Moments later a cold, figureless voice came over the bridge's speakers.

"Hello, _Corsair_ ," the voice continued "there is a cargo ship inbound, the Shipmaster said they were experiencing technical difficulties. You are required to monitor the ship as it makes its final approach to make sure it is okay. The _Dolum_ should be making its final approach from bearing 36 29 in exactly thirty-six tics."

"Aye, command we're…"

"Uh, excuse me Shipmaster" Zek interrupted, sheepishly

"What is it Lieutenant?"

"You know this is an automated message right, it doesn't matter if you respond or not. It can't hear you."

"Oh, of course" she responded, desperately trying to hide her blushing face. "Helmsmen, turn the ship towards that heading."

"Aye Shipmaster." And with that, the ship began to rotate, and eventually, it began to move, slowly drifting out of orbit. Delicately floating by the orbital defense platforms guarding the vital planet from attacks. Just as the ship cleared the ring of orbiting death, a bright flash of light signaled the cargo ship's arrival.

The large merchant vessel was nothing like its warring counterpart. Instead of a sleek black obsidian hull it was a basically just a massive gray cube with engines attached to it.

"Lieutenant Tar, I want a status report on that ship, tell me if there's anything wrong with it. Command said the Shipmaster was reporting technical troubles."

"Aye Shipmaster, I know. I was there." Tar responded as he tapped away at his holo-display. A few moments later he responded, "Um, Shipmaster, something does appear to be wrong with that ship." He said his face twisting into a look of pure confusion.

"What is it, Lieutenant?"

"Well, nothing's wrong with the ships technical systems but its crew is, gone."

"What do you mean the crew's gone? How's that possible?" She asked, seemingly just as confused as her subordinate.

"As far as I can tell there are no lifeforms aboard that ship, the crew's gone."

"Then who's driving it?"

"I'm not sure."

"It might be on autopilot," Zek suggested, attempting to alleviate the confusion.

"That's impossible," Vex chimed in "the autopilot can't use the hyper speed."

"Well then, why don't we just call them," Shrike said, finally taking control of the situation. "Lieutenant Zek, hail that vessel."

"Aye, shipmaster. Attention _Dolum_ , this is the _Corsair_ , please respond, I repeat, please respond."

After a few short moments the transmission screen materialized itself in front of the viewing window, and on it, a large metallic figure.

"What the he…" Was all Shrike managed to get out before a massive flash of light filled the cockpit as a shockwave rocked the ship, and then darkness.

...

Pidge winced as she narrowly avoided a head-on collision with the trunk of a massive tree, just one of the countless surrounding the young paladin as she raced along on a small gray speeder bike. The very same speeder Lord Morgan had loaned her this morning, moments before he'd explained to her that their hunting expedition involved reenacting the chase scene from _Return of the Jedi_. The only difference was, instead of chasing Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher they were hunting something the old noblemen called a Bone Crusher, a name she hoped was a misnomer and not an accurate description. Not that it mattered, based on the fact that she'd nearly crashed six times so far, she'd probably end up dead long before she ever actually saw this thing, whatever it looked like.

"Lady Holt," Lord Morgan said, his voice coming in over the intercom in her helmet. "I believe I've found the Bone Crusher's trail, it should be up ahead on your left."

"Got it," she replied, leaning ever so slightly to her left in order to correct her course. "So, what exactly am I looking for up here?"

"Trust me young one, you'll know it when you see it."

"Okay then," she said, ending the transmission "great, like driving this thing wasn't hard enough. Now I have to keep a look out fo…" just then, the young paladin's speeder came to a sudden stop, her stunted eyes locked on the trail Lord Morgan had been talking about, and what a trail it was.

The forest floor was littered with debris, shards of wood stuck out of the ground like fence posts, chunks of earth and stone were haphazardly tossed about, and a chain of massive footprints the likes of which she'd never seen lead deeper and deeper into the dense wilderness, flanked on either side by the bent and splintered remains of what had once been mighty oaks. Though, these mangled stumps bared little resemblance to the once towering pillars of bark they'd once been. The carnage was enough to make anyone aware of their own mortality, lose their nerve and turn back. Unfortunately, this was not an option for the young paladin, she couldn't turn back, no matter how scared she was. She had to convince Lord Morgan to support her cause and to do that she had to one, show him how brave she really was, and two, make sure he wasn't horribly killed by whatever terrifying hell beast had mangled the foliage in front of her. Which meant she had to catch up with the old men who, hopefully, hadn't already found said hell beast.

"How do I keep getting myself into these situations?" she asked before taking off, following the trail of carnage towards whatever monster awaited her at its end.

...

"Commander! Commander! Wake up, come on. Please don't tell me you're concussed again!" a muffled voice yelled, the barely discernable words ricocheting around the hectic bridge.

Suddenly, Shrike's eyes shot open as the young Commander shot to her feet grumbling to herself as she frantically looked around the room, desperately trying to piece together what exactly was going on. The last thing she remembered was seeing a Galra sentry on the display screen of the cargo ship and then, nothing.

"Commander!" Tar shouted from across the bridge "Are you okay?"

"Yes, yes I'm fine." she replied her voice shaking.

"Good, because we need orders! We've got enemy ships inbound, shields are at seven percent, targeting systems are offline and we have hull breaches on decks three, five, and six." The lieutenant shouted, his eyes glued to the holo-display in front of him. Unfortunately, the words barley registered in Shrikes mind, her head was reeling and the sheer amount of information was too much for her to handle in her current state.

"What, what happened to us?" her voice was still shaky "what happened to Zek?"

"The _Dolum_ exploded," Tar replied, still enthralled by his screen. "it was some kind of Galra trap. Damn thing went up right in our face, shields took the brunt of the blast by the shock wave still jacked us up pretty bad. As for Zek, he's out cold and I can't get him up which means I'm stuck doing both our jobs. Now, am I going to be adding Shipmaster to job description, or are you actually going to start giving bloody orders?" he asked, his tune far harsher than any she'd heard the young man use before.

"Helmsmen Vex, are you still alive?" She asked, finally taking charge.

"Aye Shipmaster, but I'm sure how much help I'm going to be. Maneuvering thrusters are shot, we'll have to reboot the entire system if you're planning on moving anytime soon."

"Fine then, forget the thrusters" Shrike replied as she locked herself in place. There was no way in hell she was being knocked down a third time. "Vex, man Zek's console divert power away from the engines and into the shields and weapons, Tar I want all of our weapons systems online now, including the ion cannon. Ensign, how many hostiles are there."

"Eight hostile ships ma'am, six destroyers and two cruisers. Four of the destroyers and a cruiser are engaging the orbital defense platforms, the other ships appear to be focused on us."

"Wait a tick," Tar yelled, his voice filled with frustration "why the hell aren't we trying to get the thrusters back online? We're dead in space without them."

"It'll take too long to bring them back on line, we'd be easy targets ether way," Shrike yelled, her voice filled with a confidence she didn't know she had. "at least this way we can shot back. Besides, we're a battleship, we can take it." And indeed they could. Even now purple beams impacted off what was left of the _Corsair's_ forward facing shields as the two destroyers charged forward, followed closely by their much larger comrade.

"But ma'am" the ensign chimed in "even with the weapons online we're only have manual targeting…"

"Don't worry ensign, aiming won't be an issue. Tar where are we on that ion canon?"

"two more ticks until we're ready to fire but, we don't have anything to shoot at."

"We will." She replied as she glared at the three ships bearing down on them. The two destroyer where coming in different angles, just beyond the ion canon's currently limited firing arc, which meant they were safe from the _Corsair's_ wrath, for now at least. "Prepare to fire the ion canon on my signal." Shrike said, crossing her arms.

From there the two ships continued on their path, hurtling towards their prey at breakneck speeds, growing every closer to not only the _Corsair_ , but each other. Finally, their paths cross one another, the two ships passing with in meters of each other straight off the _Corsair's_ bow. They were planning on criss crossing in front of the massive vessel before beginning to circle their seemingly disabled target, like a pair of sharks preparing to go in for the kill. From there they'd chip away at the ship's already diminished shields and armor. Unfortunately for them, they never got that chance to enact this plan. The instant one of the destroyers crossed in front of the other the _Corsair's_ ion canon fired, sending a shining blue beam hurtling towards the unsuspecting ships.

The lead ship was absolutely demolished by the blast, the massive beam bisecting the destroy along its beam. Causing the vessel to split into two nearly equal halves, almost as if it had been cut by a massive sword. Unfortunately, the second destroyer's wounds weren't nearly as debilitating. The beam did go shooting out the aft of the lead ship, but it only managed to graze the second ship. Carving a destructive path across the ship's bow, melting away the outer armor but only dealing superficial damage. The ship continued along its course, coming alongside the _Corsair_ and laying into its starboard flank with every weapon it could bring to bear. Luckily, the battleship's own starboard armaments where able to return fire, damaging, but not destroying, the smaller ship. Then, the enemy cruiser finally began to overtake the _Corsair_ , the daunting enemy vessel approaching form just above its prey, just above the _Corsair's_ field of fire. Soon, the Galra ship released dozens of fighters, along with score upon score of small metallic pods, all of which impacted against the _Corsair's_ hull lodging themselves in the thick armor plates.

"God damn it!" Shrike yelled, infuriated by the fact that her plan had failed to eliminate the second enemy destroyer as she'd originally intended. Now she had to find another way to take out that ship before it slowly drained the life out of them, inflicting dozens of small wounds until finally, the mighty ship succumbed to its injuries. And now they had to deal with that cruiser before it completely obliterated them.

"Shipmaster we have a problem!" Tar screamed, a look of horror plastered on his normally smiling face.

"I know lieutenant, I know, we have to take out that cruiser before…"

"It's not that, the Galra, they've launched boarding craft. We've got enemy sentries moving throughout the ship as we speak."

"Shit!" she yelled, losing her recently obtained composer "Ensign, sound the alarm! Have the crew ready to repel all boarders, send a security team to the hanger, med bay' and bridge now!"

"Aye Shipmaster," he responded as he smashed a large red button on his console causing a bright red light to flash as a siren began to blare. "security teams are on rou…" before he could finish his sentence, a massive explosion erupted in the back of the bridge causing thick black smoke to fill the room. Then all hell broke loose, purple blasts of energy poured into the room, sending the entire command staff diving for cover, everyone except for Shrike that is. She stayed right where she was, drawing her pistol before sending round after round through the smoke filled doorway, refusing to surrender. Then a purple cable came souring out of the smoke and wrapped itself around her wrist, luckily Lieutenant Tar rushed up and grabbed hold of her other hand, preventing her from being pulled through the mangled doorway towards the Galra sentries waiting beyond.

"You're not getting her you bloody bastards!" he screamed, using his pistol to gun down a pair of sentries as they rushed through the door towards the platform. Apparently, the Galra took this as a challenge because they soon focused all their fire on the young office. Unfortunately, this tactic worked, three rounds slammed Tar right in the shoulder, causing him to release his grip on his superior. Now with nothing to hold her back, Shrike was quickly dragged through the door, moments before a grenade came hurtling into the room.

"Everybody hit the deck." Was the last thing any of them heard before yet another explosion rocked the bridge, incapacitating the crew."

...

"Don't worry I'm on my way!" Pidge shouted as she floored the accelerator on her speeder bike, throwing cation to the wind as she raced through the dense wood, hell-bent on rescuing her companion from whatever deadly situation he'd gotten himself into. She'd just finished a conversation with Lord Morgan and needless to say, it hadn't ended very peacefully. The old noble had called to inform her that he'd located their prey and that he was about to engage the beast. Pidge, after following the beast's path of destruction for the better part of an hour, believed this to be an absolutely horrible idea and was about to share this opinion with the nobleman when the signal suddenly went dead. A clear cut sign that something had gone wrong and that Pidge now had to rescue the old noble from whatever trouble he'd gotten himself into.

Unfortunately, as the creature came into view, she began to doubt whether or not she'd really be able to do much against the towering behemoth. The monster stood well over ten feet tall, had short back legs and long arms which it used to balance, was also covered in armor, and had two massive tusks. If Pidge had to describe it, she would have said it looked like some unholy hell spawn of an armadillo, a gorilla, and an elephant, and worst of all, this hell spawn was about to crush Lord Morgan.

The old man was pinned under the remnants of his own speeder, desperately trying to free himself as the monster bared down on him. Unfortunately, he seemed unable too free himself, meaning Pidge had to find some way to distract the Bone Crusher, which meant she'd probably have to attack it. A plan she defiantly didn't feel confident about.

She aimed the nose of her bike right at the beast and squeezed the trigger, sending two bursts of blue laser fire hurtling towards her target, only to impact harmlessly off the beast's thick hide.

"What the hell?" she screamed as still charging head first at the monster, despite the seeming futility of her attack. "If the blasters don't work on this thing, then what was our pl…" before she could finish her sentence the Bone Crusher spun around and grabbed Pidge as she tried to race by on her speeder, which without its piolet went crashing into a tree and exploded. Panicking, the young paladin grabbed her Bayard and soon began slashing at the beast's arm, to little effect. It seemed that just like its back, its arms were also covered in think armor meaning she'd need a new plan of attack, and quick. Luckily, she managed to come up with one moments before the Bone Crusher was about to smash her head first into a rock. She noticed that its under belly appeared unarmored and thus vulnerable. Seizing her opportunity, she fired her grappling hook into the monster's belly and began to electrocute it, causing the beast to roar in pain. Realizing that the small green and white thing it had in its hand was the cause of its pain the Bone Crusher hurled the paladin into a nearby tree, the young girl's momentum dislodging the grappling hook from the beast's soft belly and thus ending his pain. Having seemingly dealt with that problem, the Bone Crusher turned its attention back towards its initial target, Lord Morgan, who was still pinned under his bike. Recognizing an easy meal, the beast slowly approached, preparing to finish off the elderly man. Unfortunately, he seemed to still have some fight left in him. As the creature came closer the trapped noblemen drew his pistol and began to fire at the beast's face. Most of his shots simply impacted off the beast's armor but one lucky blast hit the creature square in the eye, blinding him and once again causing him to roar in agony. Unfortunately, the creature's suffering had not yet ended. Suddenly dozens of tree branches began to fall on his head worsening its already intense pain. Franticly, searching for the cause of this offense, the creature soon spotted Pidge, standing twenty feet away, firing her grappling hook into the canopy and pulling down tree branch after tree branch smack dab onto his head. Infuriated that his lunch was putting up so much of a fight, the Bone Crusher charged head first at Pidge, preparing to either gore her with his tusks or smash her against the tree behind her. Unfortunately for him, his now diminished vision had prevented him from noticing that the tree Pidge was standing in front of was located at the precipice of a rather large crevice, roughly twenty feet wide and sixty feet deep. More than big enough to fit the massive beast, not that he'd survive the fall. So, blissfully unaware of the danger, the Bone Crusher continued to charged forward until he'd finally closed the distance and was about to crush the paladin. But before he could, she fired off her armorer's jet pack, leaped over his head and watched as he plowed right through the massive tree trunk and plummeted head first to his death, almost as if he was the villain in some old cartoon.

Having finished off her prey, the young paladin rushed over to her trapped companion and began to help him up.

"Lucky you invited my huh, you were almost Bone Crusher chow." Pidge joked attempting to lighten the mood. Based on the Lords expression, she'd failed. "What's the matter, you look like you've seen a Ghost?"

"I'm afraid a have some bad news young one, the attack was not the reason our call was cut short. While I was speaking with you I received a transmission from planetary defense command. Ticks before the Bone Crusher ambushed me, they told me Galra ships are attacking the orbital defenses. I'm afraid your friend Sun Vac and his crew are in terrible, terrible danger." His words hit Pidge like a hammer. She stood there for a few moments, her face frozen into a look of stunted confusion until finally, she spoke.

"I need to get up there, now."

...

The _Corsair_ floated throw space, seemingly derelict, its guns having fallen silent several minutes' prior. Now it simply sat there, dead in space as the two Galra vessels loomed over it, almost as if they were holding the _Corsair_ hostage. A description which, in realty, wasn't that far off. The two ships where simply waiting until there boarding craft could return home with their prize. Unfortunately, for them, they were going to be leaving early. The four destroyers sent to distract the orbital defenses had already been taken out and the Cruiser was in bad shape, once it was gone, all of the planet's defenses would soon be turned against them.

Suddenly, a blue beam impacted the destroyer just in front of its engines, causing the ship to erupt as its internal systems combusted, turning the whole ship into a singular, massive fire ball twice the size of the ship itself. That's when the beams origin point came into view, a massive white warship leading a formation of similarly colored destroyers. Realizing that the situation had quickly turned against it, the Cruiser quickly turned away from the _Corsair_ , its countless boarding craft rushing to return to their mothership before it frantically jumped to hyper speed and escaped. As this was going on, a small squad of Lincar soldier was moving through the _Corsair's_ interior, seemingly unaware of the exodus their enemies were undertaking.

After wandering through the vast corridors of the massive capital ship for a few minutes the group reached their destination, the ship's medical bay. There, two of the soldiers quickly began to pry open the scorched double doors blocking their entrance to vital room. As they did this, the other three members of their squad leveled their rifles and prepared to open fire at whatever was waiting for them on the other side of the door. Once it was open however, all they could do was stare in stunted amazement.

The remnants of four destroyed Galra sentries were scattered about, the walls were covered in blaster marks, and a dead Galra soldier was lying on the floor in a heap, blood still flowing from his neck. And standing over him, breathing heavily, wearing a blood-soaked medical smock and grasping a knife, was their commanding officer, Sun Vac. The young Shipmaster was the only person still standing, the med bays staff had all either taken cover or been wounded in whatever horrible maelstrom had resulted in the scene before them. Slowly, Sun looked up from his victim, his eyes filled with an icy cruelness more befitting an animal than a sentient creature. Then he spoke, his voice little more than a whisper and yet, each word sent a chill running down the spines of his men.

"What the hell, did they do to my ship?"


	9. Chapter 9

"I swear to God if you poke me with that thing again I will throw you out the air lock. Do you understand me doctor?" Sun yelled, his harsh words echoing off the scorched wall of the _Corsair's_ bridge. The aggravated shipmaster was currently standing atop the mangled command platform in the middle of his ship's battle damaged command center, staring down the young doctor standing next to him, a small metal instrument clutched in her shaking hand.

"I understand Shipmaster." She said, her voice trembling. The young doctor, like most of the crew, wasn't used to the seeing her commander act like this. The way he moved, the way he talked, it was like he was completely different person. "It's just, you shouldn't be exerting yourself like this. You left your healing pod far earlier then you were supposed to, all your wounds may not have healed properly. You shouldn't be rushing around like this, you ne…"

"There are lots of things that _shouldn't_ be happening right now, Doctor. My ship _shouldn't_ be cripple, my second in command shouldn't be a Galra prisoner, and my head doctor _shouldn't_ be standing on the bridge pestering me while there are wounded crew members, including half of my command staff, waiting for treatment in the med bay. If you're so concerned with fixing things that _shouldn't_ be happening, I suggest you start with the later. That is, unless you wish to continue standing there gawking at me like a confused child?" This final outburst drew the attention of Helmsman Vex and Ensign Caz, the only other people on the bridge. Unlike most of the crew, the two officers had seen their superior act like this before, though, that had been quite some time ago. Back before Sun had changed their lives forever. Back then Sun hadn't yet adopted his calm and cool persona, that part of him only ever appeared in combat. When every someone wasn't trying to kill him, he'd stump around a permanent snarl on his face, using anger to cover up his insecurities. That was the Sun people told stories about, the one people were afraid of, the Galra's favorite Ghost bogyman. Now he was different, or at least he attacked like it. Honestly the people who'd known him back then often found it hard to tell whether he'd changed or simply gotten better at pretending to be more "civilized" when he was around nobles. Times like this tended to make then lean more towards the later. They'd never seen Sun that angry before. As the Doctor existed the room, clearly shaken, they couldn't help but wonder if maybe he knew something they didn't.

"Um, Shipmaster" Vex began, hesitantly. "Are you okay? You seem agitated"

"I'm fine helmsmen, I'm just upset." Sun replied, his tone softening. "This is all my fault. I shouldn't have been so reckless back on Amicus, maybe then I could've been here to stop this."

"It's not your fault commander, there's no way you could've know. This is our fault, I'm sorry."

"Don't you dare apologies Helmsmen. The blame for what happened lies with me, and me alone. You're my crew, that make it my job to protect, no matter what, and I failed. And for that I'm truly sorry."

"If I may interject" Caz began, looking up from the sparking machinery he was repairing. "You shouldn't blame yourself, you weren't in command, Shrike was. If anything, it's her fault."

"It's not her fault" Sun said, seemingly aggravated by Caz's attempt to console him. "she didn't have the experience necessary to handle this situation. Honestly I'm not sure anyone truly did, never the less, she should've never been in command. This is my ship and I should've been here to taking care of it."

"No offense boss, your kind of being ridiculous. It's not your fault you got hurt and you sure as hell didn't have Shrike transferred here."

"It doesn't matter, I knew she knew she was too inexperienced to be in command but I went along with it, instead of having her transferred."  
"No offense Sir," Caz interjected politely. "But I would have been more concerned if you had transferred her."

"What do you mean Ensign?"

"Well, it just…"

Suddenly, Caz was cut off mid-sentence as a green and white blur rushed into the bridge tackling Sun to the ground and prompting his two subordinates to draw their weapons, leveling them at the mysterious attacker. Luckily, before they opened fire the pair realized the strange creature that'd attacked and subdued their leader was just Pidge.

"Sun!" she gleefully screamed, embracing the startled captain even though they were both currently laying on the ground. "I'm so happy to see you, I was so worried that you'd been hurt, and I didn't know where you where, and stuff was broken, and people were hurt, and I didn't know if you were okay, and I can't believe you're about and walking, oh my God are you okay?" she asked, finally pausing.

"Well" Sun wheezed out, the paladin's weight compressing his chest. "I'm fine Miss Holt, though I do appear to be having a bit of difficulty breathing."

"Oh" Pidge said, realizing her error and swiftly standing before offering Sun a hand up. A hand he happily took, as much as he hated to admit it, he was still feeling the effects of his run in with that Druid back at Amy's estate. Never the less, he couldn't let his personal discomfort distract him from his duties as a Shipmaster, besides he'd been through worse.

"I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to do that I was just excited. Are you okay?"

"Don't worry Miss Holt, I'm fine. It'll take a lot more than a few cut to finally put me in the ground." He responded, hoping to use his confidence and bravado to cover up his pain and discomfort.

"Either way, I was still worried about you, and I wasn't the only one."

"What do you mean by that?" Sun asked, everything Vex and Caz had told him seemed to indicate that his crew had total confidence in the fact that he was going to pull through. Hell, there'd even been a pool going around as to how earlier he'd wake up, a pool Tar had apparently won. A fact he'd have to share with the wounded lieutenant if he ever regained consciousness.

"Commander Shrike, she seemed really shaken up by what happened, speaking of which, is she okay? I figured she'd be here with you guys." Pidge said, finally taking a second to survey her surroundings. "Where is everybody?"

"I'm afraid I have some bad news Miss Holt," Sun said, disappear and frustration in his voice. "Zek and Tar were both wounded during the Galra attack."

"My God, what happened?"

"Zek was knocked unconscious when the _Dolum_ exploded, the doctors said he suffered savvier concussion as for Tar, he was shot multiple times while attempting to stop the Galra from capturing Commander Shrike. Unfortunately, he failed."

Pidge instantly recognized the sadness in Sun's voice, she was all too familiar with the despair currently plaguing the young captain. In fact, she'd felt it herself, back when Matt and her father had first disappeared. The idea that something had happened to her family, something she couldn't stop no matter how hard she tried, it made her feel so helpless. She'd sworn that she'd never let herself feel like that again, that she'd do everything in her power to protect her family, and now Sun was feeling the same way, and there was nothing she could do about it. She knew he wouldn't feel better until he either saved Shrike, or died trying, an outcome she wished to avoid at all costs. The only solution she could think of was to try and get his mind off it.

"Well" she began awkwardly "At least you're okay, I feel a lot better knowing you've back, especially with all that's happened lately."

"She's not he only one" Caz said, attempting to assist the young Paladin in lifting his commander's spirits. "We all count you, we you've always looked out for us no matter what. Hell, we'd probably all be dead right now if it wasn't for you. You've saved our countless times; you can't beat yourself up over the one time you weren't there to protect us."

"Yeah," Pidge said, "It not your fault, you can't save everyone."

"Trust me Miss Holt, I know, but I can save her. I know where she is…"

"Wait, how?"

"When I woke up, the first thing a saw was a Galra. After I'd taken care the sentries, I managed to get my hands on the Soldier leading him. Before I killed him, I forced him to give up information about his mission. He told me they'd been given three object when they were ordered to board the _Corsair_. Capture your lion, kidnap Shrike, destroy the ship and kill me."

"Wait," Pidge said, interrupting Sun's grim story "Why in God's name would they want to kill you? I mean, I know they're Galra and they try to kill everyone, but why single you out like that."

"Simply," Caz said, his face still attempting to repair the pile of destroyed electronics that used to be his console. "Its standard Galra boarding producer, kill a ship's Commander, chain of command breaks, use the ensuing chaos to destroy the ship."

"Okay," Pidge replied, "but that still doesn't explain why they kidnaped the Commander?"

"I think I might have the answer to that one Miss Holt,"

"What?"

"Remember how you told me about that time you and your friend attacked that Balmar?"

"You think their trying to lure me into an ambush." Pidge answered,

"Exactly,"

"Well then, I hope they don't mind waiting, by the looks of things we're not going anywhere anytime soon."

"Not exactly," Sun said, his tune concerning the young paladin.

"What you mean?"

"Honestly, I'm not quite sure how to tell you this Miss Holt, but you're not coming with us. This is where we part ways."

…

Commander Shrike's eye shot open as she suddenly regained consciousness, not that it helped. The room she currently found herself in was completely dark, a fact that helped to inspired fear and panic in the young officer. She'd always been afraid of the dark, she always thought that someone or something was hiding in the shadows, waiting to strike. Even now, the shadows lurking in the darkness began to morph into silhouettes of horrible beasts and monsters, at least, that's what they looked like her. Whether they were real or simply imagined, the young commander wasn't content to simply sit there and wait as these beasts ripped her apart. She tried to draw her weapon only to find her hands bound behind her back, panicking, she tried to stand up, another futile endeavor. Her left leg buckled as soon as she tried to rest her weight upon it, an intense pain gripping the clearly broken limb as she collapsed. Unable to break her fall, the young commander smashed face first into the cold hard ground, a loud thud reverberating of the hidden walls, mocking the fallen officer. Seemingly defeated, the young officer rolled over, and began to call for help.

"Hello is anyone there? Where am I, what's going on? Can someone please help me? Will someone please just turn on the lights?"

"Why my dear?" A female voice suddenly emerged from the darkness, startling her. The mysterious voice reverberated off the walls, making it impossible for the terrified Commander to determine where it was coming from.

"Who, who are you?" Shrike asked as she sat up. "Where are you?"

"You're not scared of the dark, are you my dear?"

"My name is Commander Shrikeof the Kingdom of Lincar," she screamed, her voice filled with terror. "I demand that you show yourself, Now!"

"You're in no place to make demands my dear?" The voice sounded closer this time, a fact which horrified the young Commander.

In a desperate attempt to move herself, Shrike began to franticly kick her legs, struggling to back away from the mystery women lurking in the darkness.

"What's wrong my dear, I'm not scaring you? Am I?"

"Don't come any closer, I swear to God I'll…"

"You'll what? You can't hurt me. You're completely helpless, like a child."

Shrike's back suddenly hit the wall bringing her frantic retreat to an abrupted. Unfortunately, she didn't appear to have put any distance between herself and the mystery women.

"Do I scare you, my dear?"

"Are… are you gonna kill me?"

"Why would I kill you my dear? You're going to grant me what I most desire."

"What's that, information? I won't talk, you won't get a damn thing out of me. You hear?" She yelled unconvincingly "I'll die before I talk."

"Trust me my dear, there's nothing you could tell me that I don't already know. No, my plan is far simpler. You my dear, are bait." As soon as she said this, a pair of glowing yellow eyes appeared inches from Shrike's face, startling the women and causing her to shriek in terror.

"Your friends will come for you, and when they do, they will die and Zarkon will be unstoppable."

"Apparently, you're not as smart as you think you are." Shrike said, chuckling to herself as tears began to form in her eyes. "I don't have any friend. Whoever you think, is coming to rescue me, you're wrong. No one's going to risk their lives to save a worthless snob like me. Lest of all that Paladin."

"That's where you're mistaken my dear…"

"Stop calling me that!" she screamed, throwing herself at the shadowy figure.

In response, the mysterious women lunged forward wrapping her hand around the frightened girls throat and pulling her closer.

"Remember, child. I only need to keep you alive long enough to lure your friend into my trap. Whether you survive past that point in time is entirely dependent on if I can find I use for you. And as of this moment, your chances of survival are slim, at best. But, who knows" she said chuckling manically to herself, "You my make fascinating test subject." And with that, she vanished without a trace.

Clearly shaken by the events that had just taken place, Shrike cruelled herself into a ball, and began to cry. And that's where she stayed, a poor scared child, sobbing in the dark.

…

"What do you mean I'm not coming with you?!" Pidge yelled as she rushed across the hanger bay floor in pursuit of Sun, whom she was currently furious at.

"I mean, you're not coming with me. You're staying here, Miss Holt, and that's final." Sun said as he continued towards a large shuttle at the other end of the hanger. "It's too dangerous…"

"Then why the hell are you going?!" she screamed in response. "Are you trying to get yourself killed or something."

"No…"

"Well that's what'll happen if you go rushing off like this. Caz said it'll take at least three days for them to get things working again, and even then, most of the systems won't be at full strength. This is a Suicide mission."

"That's an interesting comment coming from someone who attacked Zarkon's Command System…" Sun replied, his tone far calmer ther his frantic commander.

"That was entirely different, we had plan…"

"And I don't?"

"You might, but if you do, it really stupide plan. I don't know where the Galra are holding Commander Strike, but unless it's made of tissue paper and gum you won't be able to rush in there and save."

"I know, that's why I'm not planning on going in guns blazing. I have a more delicate approach in mind."

"What, do you have magic powers I didn't know about? Because if you don't I don't see how you're planning on pulling this off."

"Well then, I guess it's a good thing you won't be accompanying us…"

"If you really think I'm just gonna sit here while you run off and get yourself killed, you're a lot dumber than I thought Sun."

"I don't expect you to sit here, I expect you to continue on you mission..."

"And how do you expect me to do that when my ride is in the middle of Galra space exploding."

"Lady Morgan has already dispatched a ship here to replace…"

"I don't want I replacement" She yelled grabbing Sun by the wrist, "I want you. You're my friend, and I can't just stand by and watch while you go get yourself killed."

"I'm sorry Miss Holt," He replied, resting his hand on the young girl's shoulder. "but, you're too important. The Voltron Alliance is the best chance for defeating Zarkon and his goons, and without you, that chance disappears, and that's something I cannot allow."

"So what?" Pidge asked as tears began to flow down her face. "I'm just supposed to let you and men die, and for what? To save some women you don't even like. Someone who was only in danger because of me. I can't let that happen. I already made a choice, I didn't go after my family because Voltron was too important, but not this time. I won't abandon you."

"I'm not asking you to abandon me Miss Holt." Sun said his face and tone softening. "I'm asking you to please listen to me. I don't expect you to understand and I don't have time to explain, but I'm responsible for Shrike, and if I don't save her, no one else will. I'm the only chance she's got to survive. So, if that means I must walk head first into a trap to rescue her, so be it. But that doesn't mean I'm willing to sacrifice the Universe's only hope, just so I can put my conscious at ease. So, I'm asking you, please stay here, complete your mission, save the universe. If you can do that, maybe it'll be worth it" and with that, a tear began to roll down the young man's face as he pulled the sobbing Paladin in for hug.

"Please Sun, I don't want you to go."

"I'm sorry, but I have to do this."

"No you don't. Please Sun, I almost lost you once already, please don't put me through that again."

"I'll try." Sun said, breaking the embrace. "Lieutenant Tar and the rest of the wounded have been transferred to the medical bay aboard one of the orbiting platforms. Please, look after them for me."

And with that, Pidge boarded the shuttle, her tear-filled eyes locking with Sun's as the as the door slowly closed. Cutting her off from the only family she had left.

Once the shuttle had departed Sun spun on his heels, the young Shipmaster wiping tears from his face as began the long track back to the bridge. He had a mission to prepare for, one he didn't expect to survive.


	10. Chapter 10

A dull roar shook the sky as massive bolts of lightning carved their way through the dense atmosphere of a remote gas giant. Each one serving as a visual indication of the violent storms ranging throughout the layers of thick purple gas the entire planet was composed of. Across this turbulent orb of devastating super storms decimated anything and everything that got in their way, making it nearly impossible for anything to safely reside in the plant's dense gaseous atmosphere. Luckily, there was a safe-haven, free of the horrid destruction that consumed the rest of the world, the planet's core. Much like the eye of a hurricane the core was free from the apocalyptic effects of the wind and lighting brought about by the planet's unstable atmospheric conditions. That made it the perfect hiding place for the _Corsair_. Tucked away within the center of a planet sized maelstrom, the damaged ship was safe from both the mother nature and the watchful eyes of the Galra Empire. It truly was an ingenious idea, one Sun would have to thank Pidge for later, if he ever saw her again. An outcome which seemed less and less likely the longer he and his command staff examined the holo-display of their target, the colossal dreadnought containing their captured Commander.

The vessel itself was massive, easily eclipsing the _Corsair_ in both size and armament. Defeating it alone would've proven to be a nearly insurmountable task, unfortunately, the station wasn't the only thing orbiting the dead planet. Six Galra warships were arranged in a loose defensive formation around the titanic dreadnought, culminating in a neigh impenetrable wall of death and devastation between Sun and his goal.

Of course, the Galra flotilla wasn't the only thing standing in his way, his own ship was hampering his rescue efforts. Despite the crew's best efforts, the _Corsair_ was still suffering from the effects of its last engagement. Sure, they'd managed to fix the hull breaches and bring the targeting systems back online, but the system was still buggy without Tar to calibrate it and there was no telling how the field repairs would hold up in combat.

Especially since they'd only managed to resort the shields to twenty-five percent their normal capacity. Not that having them at full strength would've made much of a difference. The _Corsair_ was never meant to slug it out with enemy ships. It was designed to be fast and maneuverable without sacrificing on fire power, a choice which had unfortunately left her with very little armor.

Normally, this wouldn't have been much of a problem, but with the engines, as damaged as they were complicated maneuvers were impossible. Meaning, that at the current moment, the _Corsair_ was a glass cannon, a very slow glass cannon. A fact that Sun found rather irritating.

He'd always preferred to out maneuver his enemies rather than smash them with brute force. It was one of the things that had always set him apart, and one of the reasons he'd survived so long. No matter the odds, he'd always managed to complete his mission without putting his crew, or his ship, in unnecessary danger.

Unfortunately, given his current tactical limitations it seemed that course of action would be nearly impossible, a fact that weighed heavy upon the young Captain as he contemplated his course of action.

A fact that did not go unnoticed by his two remaining officers.

Even now as the two men sat at opposite sides of the once pristine bridge, glaring at the massive hologram, an overpowering sense of dread and despair continued to form in the back of their minds, and for good reason.

The massive dreadnought and its impressive flotilla presented an impenetrable wall of death. Even the planet they orbited seemed to emanate an aura of death and destruction.

The small world was located far closer to the system's star then the _Corsair's_ current hiding spot, and there for, was little more than a barren rock, any trace of water or atmosphere having been scorched away by solar radiation centuries ago.

Eventually, Caz stood up, approaching the massive hologram as he slowly began to speak. "I hate to be the one to say it, but maybe we should reconsider this whole, rescue mission."

"What a surprise?" Vex said from across the room, a small hint of disdain in his voice. "Caz wants to run from a fight. Who could've guessed that?"

"You know what?" Caz yelled, his eyes shooting daggers at his seated comrade. "You might out rank me boy, but I've been in more battles then you could possibly imagine, so don't mistake my common sense for cowardice! Do you see what we're up against? Even if the _Corsair_ wasn't falling apart around us we'd be wiped from existence the instant we left the atmosphere! So, whether you want to admit it or not, there is no way in hell we can pull this off!"

"I'm glad to see you have so much faith in our Shipmaster. Truly, you are a paragon of loyalty." Vex sarcastically replied as he rose to his feet. "If anyone can find a way to rescue Commander Shrike it's Sun. So, I suggest you sit your treacherous hide back down and wait for him to make a decision before I bust your skull..."

"Don't threaten me, boy!" Vex screamed, his face twisted in a snarl. "And in case you forgot I was a part of Sun's crew long before you were ever put on this ship, so don't lecture me on loyalty! I'd follow Sun to hell and back if he needed, but he doesn't. Shrike does, and I'm not going to throw my life away trying to save some stuck up high-born bit…"

"Both of you **SHUT UP NOW**!" Sun roared, silencing his bickering subordinates.

"What the hell is wrong with you two," he continued as he stepped down from the haggard remains of his command platform.

"…is this all you are?! A bunch of rabid animals that turn on each other the second things look bad?!" he paused for a moment, waiting more for emphasis than an actual answer.

"... NO, it's not! We're soldiers damn it, we're supposed to work together! To adapt, to survive, no matter what! Or have you two forgotten that?! Because I sure as hell haven't!" Sun screamed, pounding his chest.

"You're better than this! I taught you better than this! So, what if we're out numbered, who gives a damn!? We've always outnumbered, and outgunned, and matched, but you know what? We've always survived, and do you know why? Because that's what we are, survivors! So that's what we're gonna do, survive, every last one of us, no matter what! **Do I make myself clear**?!" Sun asked, his steely gaze rapidly shifting between the two stunned officers.

"Yes Sir," they answered, timidly.

" **What was that**?!" Sun Shouted in response.

" _Aye Shipmaster_!" They screamed in unison, their incendiary attitude thoroughly shattered by their commander's stern words.

"Good" Sun replied, the rage slowly leaving his voice. "now then, do I have to single-handedly save our asses again or did all that screaming actually manage to give one of you two geniuses an idea?"

"We could try praying?" Caz deadpanned, a desperate attempt to lighten the mood.

"You need to take this seriously Ensign." Vex snapped, irritated by his comrade's weak jest.

"I am being serious," Caz continued, gesturing towards the massive hologram. "…look at this shit. A dreadnought, six capital ships, God knows how many fighters, we'd be flying into a literal maelstrom of death. Not to mention the fact that if this really is a trap…"

"If the Shipmaster says it's a trap, then it's a trap," Vex interrupted.

"Well then" Caz continued as he rolled his eyes. "…they've got at least two, maybe even three more battle-groups waiting to attack the second we engage."

"He's right." Sun replied, "My best guess, they're waiting for us to engage, and once we do, they'll tie us down with fighters, jump the rest of the ships in behind us, and then…"

"BOOM!" Caz yelled, punching his hand. "we're all dead."

"Great" Sun began, sighing as he squeezed the space between his eyes, "so we can add tactical genius to their list of advantages."

"What makes you say that?" Vex asked, baffled by his commander's nonsensical leap in logic. "I don't see how coming up with a half descent strategy makes whatever arrogant prick they've got leading that flotilla a genius?"

"I hate to agree with the boy," Caz asked, "but he has a point."

"Isn't it obvious?" Sun asked, his voiced filled with genuine surprise.

"Should it be?" Caz asked.

"How can you not remember?" Sun asked, examining his comrade face for any sign of recollection.

"Remember what?" Vex asked, clearly confused by the exchange going on between his comrades.

"The Argon campaign…" Sun began, "…the battle of Tarfful, The…"

"Siege of Caliban," Caz said, his voice filled with sudden recollection.

"Oh yeah, Caliban, that's right….," Vex began, "I have no idea what in God's name you guys are talking about. Are you sure you two didn't get cracked in the head a few times back over Altilis?"

"Us?! You're the one with the memory of a noghrian rock fly! How could you not remember, you were the one driving the damn sh …"?

Suddenly, Sun's voice cut across the bridge, silencing Caz.

"Rex."

"Excuse me?" Vex asked, confused by his shipmaster random interruption.

"First Lieutenant Dom Rex," Sun replied, his words haunted by an eerie chill.

"Are you sure?" Caz asked before jabbing his thumb in Vex's direction. "I could have sworn it was this idiot."

"Hey," Vex began before being interrupted once again.

"I'm sure Ensign. Helmsmen Vex didn't join our crew until after Am… Duchess Merlin had us transferred to her fleet."

"Then why do I distinctly remember hating our Helmsmen for the entire Argon Campaign?"

"Because you hate most people."

"Oh yeah, good point."

"Seriously, who the hell is Rex?" Vex asked, frustrated.

"* _sigh_ * Rex was the Helmsmen you replaced," Sun replied as slowly he lowered his gaze. "He was killed three days before we received our transfer orders."

"Oh," Vex said, unsure how to respond. He knew Sun didn't like to discuss their dead comrades.

"Well then, I guess that means we have some explaining to do," Caz said, awkwardly.

"You see, most Galra warships have between two or three dozen drone fighters on board at any given time. But a dreadnought, especially one that big, has anywhere between a few hundred to thousand fighters."

"I already know all this Ensign, what does it have to do with their commander being some kind of genius?"

"Come on Vex, you're a smart guy. I'm sure you can figure it out."

"Figure what out? You guys aren't making any sense, what do ship specs have to do with their Commander's intelligence.

"*sigh*You see that star," he said, pointing at the hologram in the center of the room. "It's giving off radiation, not enough to kill us, but more than enough to screw with our ship's targeting systems, that's means that it'll be nearly impossible for us to take out any small targets like, for example, a swarm of Galra drone fighters.

"Oh that…" Vex replied, blushing.

"I knew that, I just thought you guys were talking about something else." He lied, desperately trying to keep himself from looking foolish in front of his Sun.

"Did anyone ever tell you, you suck at lying?"

"Did anyone ever tell you you're a prick?"

"Wow, I thought you…"

"Gentlemen!" Sun interrupted, "Can we please stay focused

"I don't know, some Galra admiral?" Vex halfheartedly replied.

"Nope, that tactic was invented by none other than our very own Captain Sun Vac. He came up with it back when we were stuck on this run down old destroyer called the Onager. We'd lure a whole mess of those purple bastards to an active star, launch ever torpedo we had, , and then run like hell. And those fools fell for it every single time."

"Well boss," Vex began as he turned to face his commander. "looks like you were wrong when you said Galra never learn from their mistakes, whoever this bastard is, he knows what he's doing, and he knows you. Or, at least you style. I hate to admit it but, we might not be able to pull this off after all."

"That's what I've been trying to say this whole time!" Caz began, "We're out gunned, out maneuvered, and out planned, no offense boss. It'll take a miracle for us to even get close to that ship."

"So, what you're saying is," Sun began, his calm voice slicing through the tension filled air like a knife "we need to pull off a miracle?"

"No, I'm saying we should probably give up and go home, but, if you're dead set on this whole suicide mission idea, then yeah, I guess what I'm saying is, we need to pull off a god damn miracle."

"Well then," Vex began triumphantly as he eyes suddenly flashed with hope. "I guess it's a good thing _miracles_ are our specialty."

"Did you really just say that out loud?" Caz asked, his palm releasing an audible thud as it collided with his forehead.

"Yes, yes I did. Do you have a problem with that Ensign?"

"No, just realizing that I'm going to die surrounded by an idiotic fanboy and a disgruntled orphan, just like the gypsy wom…"

"Both of you, **FOCUS** " Sun yelled, much to his own discomfort. He didn't enjoy screaming at his crew, hell, he didn't like screaming period. Unfortunately, at the current moment, his harsh words were the only thing keeping his subordinates from resuming their petty squabbles.

"Complementing me and complaining about our situation isn't going to solve anything and one way or another we're saving the Commander. So, unless you want to go charging into battle guns blazing like a bunch of brain dead yelmores I'd suggest we start thinking."

"Well," Caz began "we don't have any Starfighters so trying to distract them while we sneak aboard is out of the question."

"We have shuttles." Vex continued,

"Wouldn't work…" Sun replied, shaking his head "…they're too big, even with the interference from the star they pick us up on their scopes before we got within a thousand units of that dreadnought."

"Well then…" Caz began chuckling to himself. "…I guess that leaves option three."

"Which is?"

"Shot ourselves out the air lock and pray to every God we can think of that we don't end up as horribly misshapen blobs of smoldering goo."

Sun's lips slowly began to twist into a small, devious smile, a smile Caz and Vex immediately recognized. As soon as Caz saw it he knew their superior had either **1)** constructed a heroically cunning plan to free Shrike, hold off the dreadnought, out maneuver the entire enemy fleet and somehow get everyone home alive. Or **2)** concocted some ludicrously dangerous gambit that would more than likely end up with him dying.

Or both.

It was normally both.

Whatever the case may be, Caz knew there was no way he could talk him out of it, not that he wouldn't try of course. He always tried, and, unfortunately, it never seemed to work.

…

"You can't be serious!" Caz yelled, his terrified voice soon becoming lost in the sea of voices flooding the corridor as the panicked young Ensign struggled to keep up with his commanding officer as they made their way through the hectic, frenzied mass of people clogging the passageway. All around them crew members frantically rushed about, each one rushing to perform his or her part of their Shipmaster's daring, if somewhat foolish, plan. Despite the chaos, however, not one collided with Sun. In fact, the boisterous herd of crew members seemed to morph around him, almost as if he was surrounded by an impenetrable force field. Caz however, was not so lucky. The young officer struggled to remain afloat in the ever-changing ocean of people in a desperate attempt to keep up with Sun.

"You do know that no matter how many times you ask me that question my answer won't change?" Sun called back to his drowning friend.

"But you don't honestly believe you can…" Caz replied moments before colliding with an engineer caring multiple rather large tools, several of which came dangerously close to landing on the young Ensign's foot.

"You should really be more careful Ensign, if you're not careful you're going to get yourself killed." Sun said, chuckling to himself.

"Really, I'm the one who's going to get himself killed?" Caz shouted after taking a few moments to recuperate. "This plan of yours is completely insane. If something goes wrong, you could end up captured… or dead… or worse."

"I'm from Umbra remember, if there is anything worse than dying I've already been through it." He replied, smirking.

"You do know you're not invincible just because you grew up in some hell hole, right?"

"I know…"

"Then why the hell do you keep acting like it?"

Suddenly, the young Shipmaster froze in place, spun around, and looked Caz dead in the eye.

"Because Caz, I don't have any other choice."

"What?" Caz began, clearly confused.

"Because if I don't people die." Sun continued. His voice soft, but intense, more intense than he'd ever been before. "Look around. These soldiers, followed me half way across the galaxy on a suicide mission to save someone they don't even like. Not because it's their job, not because they think we can pull this off, not because they want to be heroes, but because I'm the only one who's ever looked out for them in this these screwed up hell hole we call the universe. They count on me, they look up me, do you have any idea what that's like? Three hundred souls looking to you for guidance? Three hundred souls who believe that no matter what happens you can get them home alive? I can't afford to doubt myself, because when I do, I screw up and when I screw up, people die, people I care about. So, if my crew needs me to do the impossible, then you can be damn sure that's what I'm going to do, even if it gets me killed. Do you understand me Ensign?"

Time seemed to stand still for a few seconds after he'd finished, almost as if the young officer's emotional confession had frozen time itself. Soon however, time began its crawl once more and soon the young Ensign began to speak.

"I understand sir." Caz finally answered, his voice little more than a stupefied whisper.

"Good," Sun continued, his previous tune slowly returning. "now if you'll excuse me, I have work to do." Once he'd finished Sun, only to be stopped by a few sudden words from Caz.

"Hey, Sun."

"Yes?" Sun asked, glancing back over his shoulder.

"I just wanted to say…you better come back in one peace you lousy ash pile, because there's no way in hell I'm listening to Vex cry his eyes out all the way back to Amicus."

Sun chuckled a few times before answering. "Don't worry Caz, I wouldn't dream of leaving you two idiots in charge of my ship." And with that, the two officers saluted each other for the last time before Sun disappeared into the endless mass of sailor crowding the cramped hallway. But, before long, a small smile began to form on the young ensign's lips as he softly whispered to himself.

"Thanks boss," he said wiping a small tear from the corner of his eye, "for everything."

…

 _I can't believe I'm about to do this._ Sun thought to himself, as he continued to pace from one end of the small metallic chamber to the other, repeating the details of his plan over and over again in his mind, searching for some kind of fatal flaw. Unfortunately, the more he scrutinized the details of his desperate last-ditch effort, the less likely it seemed he'd ever be able to determine a _single_ crippling flaw. If he was being honest, his entire plan was riddled with weaknesses and tactile oversights, any of which could have put a quick and violent end to the young captain's rescue mission.

Unfortunately, he didn't have a much of a choice. He didn't have time to come up with a better plan, they needed to rescue Shrike now. Sun could only imagine what kind of horrible torture she was being subjected to at this very moment. Not to mention the fact that the longer they stayed hidden this close to the Galra fleet, the greater the chance they would somehow be discovered. A series of events that would inevitably lead to their destruction.

Besides, it was doubtful Sun would ever be able to formulate a strategy even marginally superior to the one he'd already created, no matter how much time he was given to do so. The truth is, with the limited resources Sun and his crew had available to them, any plan they could create would be severely flawed. At least with this plan they had the element of surprise on their side.

No one in their right mind would ever expect someone to try and board a Galra dreadnought, especially not like this.

Suddenly, a robotic voice filled the small chamber Sun was currently residing in. _"Caution, Caution, Caution, Airlock opening, Airlock opening. Explosive decompression in ten…nine…eight…."_

As the voice began to count down, Sun braced himself in preparation.

 _You know,_ Sun thought to himself, _maybe this is a bad_ id _…_

Before he could finish his thought, the airlock shot open, launching Sun into the cold, endless void of space.

…

A small red light suddenly began to flash catching the attention of the Galra soldier looming over the control panel.

"Hey," she shouted, addressing her comrade.

"What?" he responded while rubbing his eyes in a desperate attempt to stay awake, a clear sign of how bored he truly was.

"I think there's something wrong with the airlock in sector four…"

"What do you mean there's something wrong with it? We just checked the damn thing an hour ago, what the hell could have possibly happened since then?"

"Well, if you'd shut up for two ticks I'd tell…"

"You don't have to be so mean, I'm just asking a question."

"Will you please just shut up, so I can tell you what the hell's going on? This might be important."

"Fine what is it."

"The computer said the air lock in sector four was opened…"

"So, it was probably just a repair sentry going for a spacewalk. Their supervisor must have forgotten to fill the notification form again. Honestly, I don't understand how that fat bastard keeps forgetting, it's the only damn thing he has to do around here." The tired Galra replied, turning his attention back to the monumental assortment of flashing lights laid out in front of him before releasing a yawn.

"Trust me, it's not a sentry." His comrade replied clearly annoyed by his seeming disinterest and what she had to say.

"And how the hell do you know that?"

"Because, the computer says the airlock was opened from the outside."

"So," he replied with indifferently. "some idiot probably forgot to report a repair again, this kind of crap happens all the time. Trust me, it's just a sentry, nothing more.

"That doesn't make any sense, the computer would never mistake a sentry for an intruder …"

"Why?" the male asked, his voice still groggy from sleep.

"What do mean why?"

"I mean, why wouldn't a sentry set off the alarm? The damn thing goes off every time the airlock has an unscheduled opening."

"Unless a sentry's the one who opened it." she replied matter-of-factly.

"Why?" her comrade asked, clearly still confused.

"Did you even read the operating manual they gave us when we got this post?"

"No, are you kidding me, that thing was like three hundred pages long?"

"So, I read it…"

"Wait really?" he said in disbelief.

"Yeah…" she replied dumbfounded by his apparent amazement

"The entire thing?"

"Yes…"

"From start to finish?"

"Yes," she replied, before groaning loudly. "you know, the fact that you're so amazed simply because I did my job is actually pretty pathetic."

"You're pathetic." He screamed, sounding more like a child then a soldier. As he did so, a scowl began to form on his face. It was clear he found no enjoyment in this conversation, in fact, he was starting to become annoyed. It was bad enough he had to spend all day locked in a tiny room staring at a massive swarm of neigh indistinguishable lights, now some overzealous replacement was ruining the only good thing about this worthless post, an ample supply of nap time.

"I am not!" she screamed in response, a sense of subtle gall and malice clear in her voice.

"Really?! You do realize, most people don't have time to sit down and read a three-hundred-page manual about when and why one of these freaking lights is going to go off."

"Well, I'm sorry if I actually care about my job, unlike you, but I'm not just going to sit around and ignore this alarm. What if someone's trying to sneak aboard?"

"Who in Zarkon's name would be trying to sneak aboard?! No one's dumb enough to try something that stupid!" He screamed clearly exasperated but his comrade's stubborn refusal to abandon her idiotic concerns. "We're in the middle of freaking nowhere, surrounded by warships, dangerously close to an active star! No one in their right mind would try and sneak board! Hell, no one in their right mind would even want to! Besides, if there was a ship within ten light years of this flotilla the witch would've sounded the alarm herself!"

"Well, we can't just ignore it?" the female replied, clearly undeterred by her begrudging co-worker's infuriated outburst.

"Have you not been listening to a single word I said? That's exactly what we should do!"

"But, if someone really is trying to sneak aboard, and command figures out we knew and choose to ignore it they'll kill us."

"Yeah, but if we raise the alarm and it turns out it's just a computer glitch, they'll be pissed again. Really, really pissed."

"Do you really think that's worse than dying?"

"You've obviously never seen what that witch does to people who piss her off. The sentries are still cleaning up what's left of the last guy that made her angry and he was an officer, he wasn't expendable like us."

"We're not expendable…"

"Damn it Z, a pair of sentries could do our job… and they'd probably be better it then we are!"

"Okay, you have a point there." She agreed, reluctantly. "So, what do we do then?"

"We could have a sentry check it out?" he replied, finally working towards a solution.

"No, we can't."

"Why not?"

"Because, we don't have the authority to repurpose drones… of course you'd have already know that if you'd actually read the manual."

"Fine," he replied before letting out an annoyed groan. "then I guess one of us has to go check it out."

"Okay then, why don't you go?"

"Wait, why do I have to go? You're the rookie, you should go."

"*sigh* One of us has to stay here in case anything else happens, and it's obvious I'm the only one who actually understands what we're supposed to be doing here."

"Fine, I'll go. But this better not be another wild yalmors chase or I'm gonna be pissed."

"Good, now the computer says the airlocks internal doors still haven't opened, that means whatever it is is still in the airlock's pressurization chamber, so all you have to do is head to sector four, open the airlock, and see if there's anything or anyone inside. If it's empty, it means this whole thing was just a computer glitch and nothing to worry about."

"And what happens if there is someone waiting inside."

"When then I guess you'll just have to take care of them. Good news is, if they're still locked in the pressurization chamber they're obviously not very good at their job."

"What if they're waiting in there on purpose?"

"Why the hell would they do that?" she asked.

"I don't know, why the hell would they try and sneak onto a worthless space station in the middle of nowhere?" He snarked in response.

"Will you just go already?" she impatiently replied.

"Fine, but if I die it's your fault."

"You're not going to die you coward." She yelled, her harsh words reverberating down the corridor as her needled comraded slowly made his way towards the airlock in question, blissfully unaware of the dangers awaiting him at his destination.

…...

"Was it red-red-green or red-green-red?" Sun mumbled as he continued to fiddle with the disordered mass of wires extruding from the panel controlling the chamber's locking mechanism.

"Damn it," he grumbled, before tearing out a fist full of wires. "they must have upgraded these things since the last time I did this. That's not good. I'll have to find a sentry and snag its hand before…" Suddenly, the young Shipmaster stopped mid-sentence and froze in place, his face twisted into an odd look of discomfort. Then, without warning he tossed the wires he was aside, unsheathed his dagger, and pressed his ear up against the door.

There it was clear as day, footsteps, and they were getting closer. Most people probably wouldn't have noticed it, especially not through an air tight metal door, but Sun wasn't most people. He could hear them loud and clear, someone coming.

Damn, he thought to himself. I must've tripped some kind of alarm. Whelp, I might as well make the best of this, besides. He thought, glaring down at the disheveled mass of wires. It's not like I was getting out of here anytime soon.

Slowly, the young Shipmaster stepped backed and readied himself.

"Five…" Sun whispered to himself "Four…Three…Two…"

Right on cue, the door flew open revealing a single Galra soldier clutching small data pad.

"What the f…" was all he managed to say before Sun attacked. In rapid section, the Young Shipmaster reached up, grabbed the man by the collar, stabbed him in the gut, threw him to the ground, and plunged his dagger through the back of the poor man's neck.

"Well," Sun said, admiring his handy work. "you're not a sentry, but you'll have to do."

Then the young captain reached down and grabbed the dead man by the wrist and placed the blade of his dagger against the man's forearm.

Wait, Sun thought, stopping himself before he could make the first insertion. this'll take at least twenty minutes and I don't have that kind of time. Well, I guess it's all for the best, Galra blood never washes out. No matter, I'll just have to grab a hand off an actually sentry on the way to the brig. And with that, Sun returned his dagger to its sheath, grabbed the blaster rifle off his back, and left the airlock.

…

Footsteps echoed though out the dreadnought's detention block as Sun inched his way down the vacant corridor leading to the Shrike's cell. Or at least Sun hoped it was Shrike's cell. Honestly, he had no idea where his missing commander was being held. Hell, for all he knew Shrike wasn't even on this ship, but ever Galra soldiers he'd "questioned" on his on trek to the detention block had told him the only prisoner they had was being held in cell 1138, the very cell he was currently approaching. Normally Sun would've never trusted a single shred of information he'd gotten from a Galra soldier, mostly due to the fact that their officers made it a point to lie as much as physically possible, therefore rendering any information extracted from a rank and file soldier completely and utterly useless. But, his current desperation combined with the sheer number of soldiers he'd "questioned" convinced him that they were telling the truth, or at the very least a reasonable facsimile.

Luckily, Sun had been able to take out every soldier he'd encountered so far without raising any alarms, a feat that most soldiers would've found impossible. This, combined with the sheer size and scale of the Dreadnought, meant the chances of anyone noticing the ship's sudden reduction in staff were rather slim. Meaning that, at least for the time being, Sun still had the element of surprise, a valuable asset intracule to Sun's overall escape plan.

Unfortunately, none of this helped to ease the Captain's troubled mind.

For some strange reason, no matter how hard Sun tried he just couldn't shake this odd feeling of dread building in the back of his mind.

Most people would have assumed this strange feeling was simply a byproduct of the dangerous situation Sun currently found himself in, unfortunately Sun wasn't most people, not by a long shot. Ironically, facing mortal danger was one of the few things that didn't put Sun edge. Unlike most aspects of life, combat came naturally to Sun, mostly due to upbringing. Hell to him, infiltrating a massive enemy warship to rescue a captured member of his crew wasn't just simple, it felt as normal to him as breathing, or at least it should have.

Instead, fear was slowly creeping its way into the back of his mind, like a parasite feeding off his own unknown apprehensions. In fact, the closer he got to his destination, the worse he began to fell. Almost as if the chamber itself was imitating an aura of death and despair.

But there was no time to worry about trivial things like fear, the distance between him and Shrike's cell was rapidly decreasing, not to mention the fact that if and when he managed to save Shrike he still had to get the both of them off of a heavy armed Galra ship and back aboard the Corsair without being completely annihilated.

Luckily the first part of his ludicrous plan was final completely, now all he had to do was open the damn door.

Whelp, Sun thought as he retrieved a severed robotic hand from his belt, here goes nothing.

Suddenly, the door flew open to reveal…. nothing.

What the hell? Sun asked himself as he hesitantly raised his blaster before crossing the thresh before him.

"This doesn't make any sense" he mumbled to himself as he examined the empty room. No matter how hard he looked there was no sign of Commander Shrike, or anyone else for that matter. There were no blankets tossed about, no scuff marks on the floor, no scratches on the walls, even the air smelled sterile and lifeless. It was as if the cell had remained vacant sense the day it's construction. In fact the longer Sun spent in that room the more he became convinced that no was, or had ever, occupied the cell his was currently exploring. And yet, nearly a dozen Galra soldiers had explicitly stated, after a bit of persuasion, that this was where they were keeping his missing comrade, and yet she was nowhere to be seen.

Maybe she's hiding? He thought as he racked his brain for ideas that didn't involve him searching ever cell the dreadnought had.

"Commander…" he whispered to the shadows tuck away in the rear of cell. "…you can come out now. I'm here to res…"

Before he could finish, someone, or something, grabbed him from behind wrapping its arms around his neck in an attempt to strangle him to death. Luckily, Sun was used to being attacked. Acting more on instinct that conscious thought he quickly lunged backwards, crushing his assailant between the wall and himself. Then, in one fluid motion, he reached back, grabbed his attacker by the hair, flipped them over his shoulder, and stomped on their chest, a demented wheeze echoing throughout the cramped chamber as the air was violently forced from their lungs. Finally, he aimed the barrel of his rifle right at his attacker's face, his finger pressed tight against the trigger, applying as much force as physically possible without actually firing the weapon. A single twitch and the mystery figures brains would be replaced with a bolt of super charged particles, and yet, he hesitated. Not out of mercy, but of confusion.

As he stood there with his weapon trained face he suddenly realized, the person he was mere ticks from killing, was the same one he'd come to rescue. Crushed beneath the young Captain's scuffed boot, was Commander Shrike, gasping for air as she struggled to breath in spite of the weight currently compressing her chest.

"By the light of God," Sun began as he removed his foot. "what the hell are you doing here?"

"That's a pretty stupid question, don't you think?" Shrike answered as she struggled to refill her lungs. "I was captured remember, a cell seems like a pretty obvious place for me to be. Now, if we're done with the interview, would you mind helping me up? It seems some oaf knocked me to ground."

"Well then," Sun said between chuckles as he helped to her feet. "I'm glad to see your incarceration hasn't put a damper on your cheery disposition. Never the less, I'd be a little more positive if I were you. Most Shipmasters wouldn't risk their necks to rescue their subordinates, especially not from the belly of a Galra dreadnought."

Shrike's suddenly changed from one of open hostility to a much softer look, almost as if she was surprised by something Sun had said.

"My apologies, Shipmaster. I didn't recognize you, my eyes have been playing tricks on me ever since they stuck me in this lightless box, and I'm sure that blow to the head I just got didn't help much either." She replied, smiling as she rubbed the back of her head.

"Sorry about that Commander, but in my defense, **you** were the one that attacked **me**."

"My apologies, Shipmaster. I thought you were a Galra soldier coming to…." Shrike began before being interrupted by a sudden burst of muffled laughter from her superior. "What's so funny?"

"Nothing, it's just… I think you've apologized to me more in the past thirty tickets then you have in our entire career together? Are you sure I didn't knock a fuse loose or something?" Sun asked as he tapped his finger against his temple.

"Don't worry Sir, it's nothing really. I'm just a little shaken after everything that's happened. I'll be okay."

"Are you sure? After everything that happened over Altilis I kind of surprised to see you up about?"

"I could say the same about you, last time I saw you, you were on the brink of death. Hell, until you opened that door I thought you were dead."

"Trust me, when I finally bite the dust it'll take a lot more than a few cheap robots and some fanatical soldiers to finally put me down." Sun replied, chuckling at his own weak jest.

"That's a little **arrogant,** don't think."

"A wise man once said, it's better to be over confident then unsure."

"What idiot ever said that?"

"Tar, several times actually."

"Whoever this Tar guy is, he sounds like he needs his head examined." Shrike replied without the slightest hint of sarcasm, a detail Sun found rather unsettling.

"Are you sure you're okay Commander?" He asked, his usually stern expression replaced by one of obvious discomfort.

"I already told you, I'm fine. I'm just a little, shaken, after everything that's happened."

Sun paused for a moment, his cold blue eyes examining every detail of her face for any noticeable distinction between the women standing before him, and the officer he'd served with for the past year and a half. But, no matter how hard he looked, he couldn't find a single detail that set her apart from the women he'd known before the gala. And yet, he couldn't shake this feeling that something was off.

 _Maybe I'm just being paranoid,_ he thought, _or maybe…._

"We should get moving," he said, hesitantly. "We have to move quickly if we want to avoid the next patrol."

"Aren't you forgetting something?" Shrike asked as she held out her hand.

"What?" she continued, clearly annoyed by Sun response, a blank expression. "You don't honestly expect me to wonder around a Galra warship unarmed, do you?"

"Sorry," Sun replied casually, "it must have slipped my mind." And with that, he took one of the pistoles off his belt, flipped around and placed the handle in his subordinates outstretched hand. "Here you go. Now then, we should get moving, I'll take point."

With that settled, the pair slowly approached the entrance to the cell, carefully checking hall for any signs of the enemy before continuing on their way. Sun took the lead, his rifle at righty as he walked, half crouched, towards the T shaped intersection at the end of the corridor. Shrike followed close behind, her pistole carefully aimed over Sun left shoulder ready to engage anyone that appeared in front of them. The pair came to a stop as they approached the first corner, hidden just out of sight from anyone that might be on either side of the intersection. With a quick wave of his hand Sun motioned for Shrike to check the left side while he cleared the right. Then, after a count of three, both soldiers slowly peered around their respective corners, just like they'd both practiced a thousand times over.

Having discovered both corridors to be vacant the pair continued on their way, methodically creeping down the corridor on the right.

"Shipmaster," Shrike whispered, her voice barely audible.

"What is it Commander?" Sun replied at a similar volume, his gaze still locked on the empty corridor in front of him

"If you don't mind me asking, where's the rest of the rescue team?"

"I am the rescue team."

"What?!" She replied barley managing to repress her own surprise long enough to quite her voice "you're the only one who came to rescue me?"

"No, I'm just the only one that came aboard."

"If that's the case, where's the rest of the crew?"

"Waiting."

"Waiting for what?"

"Us, once we reach the hanger all we have to do is steal a pair of fighter and rendezvous with them and we'll be home free."

"That's your plan?" She replied cynically.

"Do you have a better idea?"

Once again Shrike was silent, and once again she began to speak after a brief intermission.

"What about the Paladin?"

"What about her?" Sun replied, his callus tone surprising the young.

"Is she with the rest of the crew?"

"No."

Shrike froze for a moment, seemingly caught off guard by his response.

"If she's not on y… our ship, where is she?"

"I'm afraid I have no idea."

"What?!"

"I left her back on Altilis, I have no idea what happened to her after that…"

Just then Sun felt the familiar feeling of a cold metal barrel being pressed against the back of his neck.

"Well then" Shrike began, her voice slowly transforming as she continued to speak, "I guess there's no reason for conversation to continue."

"What the hell did you do with my Commander?" Sun barked, tossing his rifle aside as he slowly raised his hands.

"That whelp, I disposed of her after she told me everything I wanted to know."

"Drop the act, I know she's still alive." Sun replied, his voice filled the brink with rage.

"What's makes you say that?"

"Because, if you're not dumb enough to kill her without getting any useful information out of her. And I know for a fact that she didn't tell you a damn thing."

"You have far too much faith in you underling Sun, that pathetic little girl broke the second I…"

"Will you stop it with that shit already. If she had told you anything, you wouldn't have done such a piss poor job pretending to be her."

"If my performance was so bad, why am I holding a loaded pistol to the back your neck?"

"Who ever said it was loaded?"

"What?"

Before the imposter could react Sun wiped around, smashing her in the face with elbow before cracking her across the jaw, stunning her long enough for him to retrieve his rifle. But before he could take aim, a mysterious force slammed into him, knocking the weapon from his hand and lunching several yards down the corridor.

Miraculously, Sun had managed to land on his feet and after a slit second delay, he drew his remaining pistole and fired several shots at his opponent who was now rapidly approaching. Unfortunately, his wraith like attacker effortlessly dodge ever shot Sun fire until finally, she reached him.

Before Sun could react the imposter swiftly knocked the pistole from hand before slashing his across the chest with what appeared to claws that had seemingly materialized out of thin aim. Then while Sun was doubled over, wincing in pain, she reached out, grabbing him by the throat and lifting him nearly a foot off the ground.

"You're going to regret striking me!" She hissed, as energy began to course through her hand electrocuting Sun.

Just then Sun reached down, quickly grabbing the hilt of his dragger before swiftly thrusting it through the forearm of his attacker, losing her enough for break free and causing her to violently shriek with pain.

"I'm getting tired of being electrocuted by you assholes." He said between desperate gasps, his muscles screaming in pain as he agonizingly picked himself up off the deck.

Unfortunately, before he could recover he was suddenly slammed into the ceiling, his whole body surrounded by an aura of dark energy. He desperately tried to move his limbs but to no avail, every inch of his body was being forced the ceiling as if some tremendous weight had been placed upon him, pinning in place.

"You worthless, peace of filth!" The imposter shrieked as she removed the blade from her arm, drops of dark energy seeming to emanate from the wound.

"It… takes one… to know one." Sun replied, each and every syllable a struggle against the overwhelming force imposed upon him.

Suddenly the imposter flicked her wrist, causing Sun to violently slam into the floor beneath him only to be immediately returned ceiling at the same destructive pace, both blows resulting in a load bang followed by several blood curdling cracks.

"Do you think you're funny?" The imposter hissed before slamming her captive into a wall.

"Do you think you're clever?" She screamed before catapulting Sun into floor.

"Do you think you're special?" She roared, returning to the ceiling.

"Do you think you matter? Well you don't!" She continued, punctuating each sentence by smashing Sun into one of the corridors many hard surfaces.

"Not to your crew!"

 ***SLAM***

"Not to that Duchess!"

 ***CRASH***

"Not to your parents!"

 ***BANG***

"And not to that Paladin!"

 ***CRACK***

And with that finally impact, Sun finally blacked out, but not before catching one last glimpse of his attacker. A hunched over women in dark robes with long white hair, and two glowing, yellow, eyes.


	11. Chapter 11

A/N Hello everybody this is Wolf, just wanted to say hello since it's been so long since the last time I posted anything. In case any of you didn't know I recently up dated Chapter 10 so you should probably reread it before reading this one. Anyway I hope you enjoy and I promise to try and cut down the time between chapters.

The station was in complete disarray as hundreds of people frantically scurried about like rats on a sinking ship desperately trying to get a grasp on their current situation. A task that was proving to be nearly impossible thanks to the sheer chaos brought about by the recent Galra assault. Of Altilis's twenty-six orbital defense platforms, a third were in need of immediate repairs, two had been crippled after being rammed by Galra destroyers, while another had been out right destroyed when the crew of a cruiser, along with its entire fighter complement, decided to self-destruct rather than allow their crippled ship to be captured. Not to mention the thousands of engineers, soldiers, piolets and technical staff that had been wounded or killed during the (relatively) short engagement making accurate casualty reports nearly impossible.

Of course, none of this mattered to Amy. No, all she cared about was finding Pidge. So, while other people were busy writing superfluous reports, or frantically recording inaccurate statistics, she was busy literally pushing her way through the crowd towards what appeared to be officer perched upon a crate, barking orders to his panicking underlings.

Of course, Amy wasn't the only one currently making her way through the ocean of hysterical soldiers. Coasting in Duchess's rather substantial wake was another woman, several years her junior. The woman, who clung to the Duchess like a shadow, was dressed in a set of black armor with a pair of blue chevrons adorning the chest. Her hair, which was also blue, was short, barely touching the back of her neck. Above her right eye, a trio of metal studs shined in the artificial light radiating from the ceiling.

Unlike her companion, who seemed perfectly content manhandling the various individuals unlucky or foolish enough to get in her path, the women in black seemed more withdrawn. Almost as if she was biding her time, waiting for the perfect moment to execute some hidden plan, though what exactly that plan may be was anyone's guess. Not that it mattered, whatever scheme she may or may not have been planning would surely pale in comparison to the sheer commotion Amy was currently creating as she finally approached the officer.

"You" She barked, her one good eye locked on the shouting man. "My name is Duchess Merlin. I'm looking for the Paladin, where is…"  
"I don't care." The man interrupted, his voice filled with irritation. "In case you haven't noticed, I'm in the middle of something, so why don't you and your little back water friend go find someone else to bug before I…"

Before he could finish, Amy kicked the crate out from under him, sending him crashing to the deck below. Then, before he could even catch his breath, she reached down, grabbed him by the collar, and lifted him clear off the ground.

"Now then," The Duchess began, glaring right into the frightened man's eyes. "Since you clearly didn't hear the first time I'm going to repeat myself, something I'd like to avoid in the future. Do you understand me?"

"Y-yes m- I mean your grace." The man sheepishly replied.

"So," Amy started, her lips slowly twisting into a smirk. An expression that was swiftly mimicked by her companion, who up to this point, had remained stoic. "you finally learned some manners. Good. Now then, I'm looking for the Voltron Paladin Captain Vac left in your care. So, if you would be so kind as to tell me where she is…"

Before she could even finish her inquiry, the man's arm shot up pointing to a large door at the other side of the hanger. "Go through that door then take a right, she's in one of the auxiliary store rooms. It'll be the third door on your left. You can't miss it."

"Thank you." The Duchess replied, her words unsettlingly sweet. "Was that so hard?"

And with that, the Duchess released the startled officer, a chorus of muted laughter and echoed thuds reverberating in her ear as she approached the designated door.

"Are you okay Ma'am?" The women in black asked, her smirk slowly fading into a look of genuine concern.

"I'm fine Captain, why do ask?" The Duchess asked, her eye still fixed on the door.

"Well," the women replied hesitantly "you're acting rather, unusual…"

"What is that supposed to mean?!" the Duchess interrupted, as the pair made their way out of the crowded hanger and into an equally crowded corridor. Luckily for the pair, reaching their destination proved to be far easier than their trek through the hanger, mostly since, after Merlin tossed the hand full of soldiers out of their path, the rest of the hallways occupants simply clung to corridor walls hoping to avoid the same fate as their unlucky comrades.

"Well," the women in black replied as she gazed upon the frightened faces lining the corridor. "you just physically assaulted someone for practically no reason…"

"There was a reason," Merlin interrupted once again. "that man was being rude."

"What about those poor blokes you tossed about in the hanger?"

"They were in our way, so I moved them."

"Okay then, what about that poor chap you decked back on the _Nova_?"

"He was blocking the door," Merlin answered defensively.

"and what about that hole you put in…"

"That's enough, Captain!" The Duchess shouted, startling the already frightened soldiers around her, several of whom took cover. "I get it, I've been acting a little…...confrontational since I heard about what happened, but it's nothing. I'm just concerned about the safety and well-being of Miss Holt, _that's all_."

"If you say so, Ma'am." The women replied, skeptically. "But honestly, I don't see what you're so worried about. If the Paladin's anything like how you described her, she'll be fine."

"Let's hope you're right," Merlin said as they finally approached the door.

With a soft, swish the door flew open to reveal a truly shocking sight. Severed robotic limbs, damaged internal circuitry, and scores of random components littered the floor while stacks of empty storage containers rose from the field of debris like obelisks in the deserts, each one supporting a heap of jerry-rigged technology connected to its peers by a complex web of neigh indistinguishable wires. And, in the middle of this chaos, laying there as still as death itself…was Pidge. …

The world refused to come into focus as Sun slowly opened his eyes, revealing nothing but an intense white light.

 _Well_ , _that's disconcerting_ , he thought to himself, struggling to remember the events that had led to his current situation.

He tried to bring his hands to eyes, hoping to wipe away whatever was disrupting his vision, only to discover that they were locked in place. A few moments of struggling soon revealed that his arms and legs were both shackled to whatever surface he was currently lying on.

 _At least I know I'm still alive._ He thought, attempting to be as optimistic as possible. In his experience, cynicism did little to help one in these situations. Not that he was entirely sure what kind of situation he in.

Unfortunately, the details on exactly how and when he had gotten himself into this particular quagmire eluded him, at least for the moment. A fact Sun attributed to the insufferable pounding in his skull, no doubt a side effect of whatever had incapacitated him.

 _Come Sun,_ he thought to himself, _what's the last thing you remember. Let's see, went to save Shrike. Hid in a planet. Shot myself out an airlock. Snuck around a Galra dreadnought. Found Shrike…...Wait, no I didn't. That wasn't Shrike. It was someone else…...someone in a hood. A woman, no not just a woman, she was a…. a…. A DRUID!_

Suddenly, the young Captain began to struggle against his restraints, thrashing about in a desperate attempt to free himself and continue his fight, but to no avail. Not that it would have mattered, he knew there was no way he'd be able to beat that witch, not in a one on one fight anyway. And yet, he still struggled, still fought, still failed.

Suddenly, the light vanished as a cold voice sounded from just beyond Sun's field of view.

"I have to admit, I'm impressed…"

 _Wait,_ Sun thought an intense rage building within him as his mind began to process what had said _, I know that voice._

"…I thought you'd be out for at least a few more vargas."

"YOU!" Sun roared, an image of the hooded women flashing through his mind as he once again attempted to break free. "I swear I'll kill you, you coward! Show yourself! Fight me!"

"Such a lively reaction…" his captor interrupted while remaining unseen. "…you better calm down, we wouldn't want to you to hurt yourself, at least not before we get a chance to talk."

Just then a dark energy enveloped Sun, pinning him down just like it had during his fight with the druid.

"Your tricks won't save you!" Sun screamed as he furiously struggled against the ethereal force restraining him. But no matter how hard he tried, the witch's magic kept him completely immobilized.

"I'm not the one who needs saving." the Druid said as Sun's eyes, no longer blinded, finally began to focus.

Unfortunately, the only thing they revealed was his captor's face, smirking back at him.

"I wouldn't be so smug if I was you..." Sun roared once again, his face twisted into an expression of pure rage. "… because when I get free, I'm gonna rip off your God Damn- augh!"

Suddenly, a searing pain began to burn in Sun's chest, replacing his threat with a cry of agony.

"I thought you would have learned during our fight that there are consequences to disrespecting me."

Slowly the pain subsided or at least lessened enough so that Sun could once again think clearly. It didn't take him long to realize that the pain was coming from the wound he'd suffered during his fight, or more accurately, the scare that had miraculously replaced it.

"The only thing that fight taught me was that I'm apparently a hell of a lot then I thought," Sun growled through clenched teeth.

"I wouldn't give yourself all the credit." His captor replied, unable to determine whether her prey's comment was meant as a jest or some form of petty insult. "I may have used a few of my _tricks_ to repair some of the damage I caused during our little skirmish."

As she fished her statement, her lips began to twist into a devious smirk, one that sent shivers down Sun spine, a feat the young Captain long thought impossible.

 _Well great_ , Sun thought as he slowly began to process the information that had been presented to him. _Some freaky Galra witch messed me while I was unconscious. Tar's gonna have a field day with this when he finds out. IF he ever finds out._

"So," Sun began, his voice and expression void of even the slightest hint of fear. "is this the part where start torturing me or are you going to just sit staring at me like a brain dead yelmore?"

"What?" the druid asked, her words immediately followed by a soft and deeply unsettling chuckle. "What makes you think I intend to torture you?"

"Why else would you waste time patching me up?"

"Like I said before, all I desire is a civilized conversation."

"And what makes you think I'd wanna have a conversation with a piece of shit like you?"

"Because," she replied as she lifted her hand, revealing it to be coursing with the same dark energy she'd utilized during their fight. "I have a feeling you'll find the alternative rather…unpleasant."

"I don't know, I've been tortured before and honestly, it wasn't half as bad as having to sit here listening to you ramble on." He snarked, a subtle smirk briefly appearing on his lips before being washed away by the sudden return of the burning in his chest. A harsh reminder that, despite her pleasant façade, his captor would not tolerate his insolence for very long.

"I assure you Captain," The druid began, her calm, cool demeanor disturbing Sun far more than any of the physical peril he currently faced. "whatever methods you may have experienced at the hands of my Lord's fellow servants, is _nothing_ compared to the pain and suffering I will inflict upon you. So, I suggest you remain silent and listen to my proposal before I'm forced to resort to far more brutal methods."

"I already know what you're going to ask," Sun grunted, still reeling from his last dose of negative reinforcement. "and I'm afraid there's a long line of people ahead of you. Besides, you're not exactly my type."

Once again, the pain in Sun's chest ignited, clouding his mind and silencing any more attempts at mockery.

"You see Sun," The Druid began once again, disregarding her captive's latest comment and instead choosing to continue with their conversation. "I know who you are. I know what you're capable of, and that's why I want to offer you a chance. A chance to become part of something bigger, something that matters. A chance to join the Garla Empire."

…

Duchess Merlin and her companion in black continued to stare on in stunned horror as they gradually attempted to make sense of the chaotic scene before them. Never having been one to sit around and wait when presented with a crisis the Duchess was the first to speak as she began to make her way through the pile of dismantled machinery that covered the floor.

"Pidge!" She yelled, kicking what appeared to be the bisected head of Galra sentry several feet as she continued to dredge through the horde of parts.

Suddenly, as if revived by the Duchess's panicked words, Pidge sprung to life, quickly sitting up before rapidly shaking her head in an attempt clear away the grog clouding her mind, all the while releasing an unrelenting barrage of 'whos', 'whats' and 'wheres'.

Startled by her friend's sudden resurrection the Duchess took several rushed steps backward, nearly tripping over a bundle of loss wires before barely managing to steady herself with the assistance of the nearby bulkhead.

While this was going on the women in black, who was clearly just as startled as the room's other two occupants, simply remained where she was observing the spectacle unfolding before her. As she was doing this, Pidge finally managed to return herself to a state of awareness adequate to register the two women standing in front of her.

"Amy!" She yelled as she attempted to stand, only to discover she was being held down by the various cables trapped across her slender farm.

"Careful," the Duchess replied, having finally recovered from her slight stumble moments before. "we wouldn't want you to fall and hit your head, now would we?"

"Are you kidding me?" Pidge asked as she freed herself from the web of cables she'd inadvertently become entangled in. "After everything I've been through in the past few weeks hitting my head would be the least horrible thing to happen to me."

"I'm glad to see the recent…. unpleasantness, hasn't put a damper on your sense of humor," Amy replied with a smile as she approached the young Paladin, carefully avoiding the countless hazards scattered about.

"And I'm glad to see you," Pidge said as she embraced the Duchess. "Wait a tick?" she asked, looking up at her friend's eyes as they continued to hug. "What are doing here anyway? Sun told me you were just sending a ship to pick me up."

"I was," Amy replied as she returned her young friend's embrace. "but then I decided it would be a good idea to tag along and see how my favorite Legendary defender was holding up. Speaking of which, how are doing?" The Duchess asked, her tone switching from one of delight to one of calm maternal support, an attribute most would not have associated with the happy go luckily Duchess.

"Honestly," Pidge replied, ending their embarrass as her expression sank into one of sorrow and regret. "pretty bad."

"I'm sorry to hear that." The Duchess replied, trying as hard as she could to comfort her young friend.

"But, look on the bright side" she continued, in an attempt to lighten the mood, "By the looks of thing, you've been busy. At least, I assume this is your doing." She finished gesturing to the mob of debris covering the floor.

"Sorry about the mess," Pidge stuttered, her face slowly reddened with embarrassment. "I meant to have everything organized by the time you showed up but I got distracted while I was combing through some of the files I recovered when I discovered what looked like a back door into the Galra battle-net but it turned out to be a dead end so I decided to give up on it but that's when I realized I could use the communications gear built into all these sentries to tap into their local communications grid, so first I built a multi-spectrum scanner to help me narrow down the right frequency then I got to work building a receiver which was actually pretty easy since I already had so experience putting one together on Earth not to mention the fact that your tech is centuries ahead of anything I had access to back on earth…"

"PIDGE!" Amy yelled, silencing Pidge and putting an abrupt end to her light speed recollection of the various engineering projects she'd been working on over the past twenty-four hours.

"I was rambling again, wasn't I?" She asked as her face once again began to change its hue. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to it's just… I'm really anxious right now, and when I'm anxious I have a tendency to start talking and honestly, I'm not even really sure why. I think it might have somethin…"

"There's no need to apologize," Amy said, hoping to stop the young Paladin before she managed to get back up to full speed.

"About the mess or about me talking so much?"

"Both," the Duchess replied as she placed her hand upon Pidge's shoulder. "I understand this must be difficult for you and I know there's a lot you want to tell and you feel I need to know all of it right now. But, if you want me to understand, you're going have to take a deep breath and slow down. Do you think you can do that for me?"

"I'll try," Pidge replied before attempting to slow down her rapidly beating heart.

"Good, now then why don't you start at the beginning. What was the first thing you did after Sun left?"

"After Sun left," Pidge began after finishing the last of her deep breaths. "the first thing I did was try to convince Lord Morgan to send some ships to go help him, but he wouldn't."

"Why not?" the Women in black yelled from the doorway, her voice far harsher than when she'd addressed the Duchess.

"Who's that?" Pidge asked as she glanced at the women in black, having up to this point been completely unaware of the fact that she was standing in the doorway.

Something about this woman seemed familiar to Pidge, but for some reason, she couldn't tell exactly what that something was.

 _Maybe it's her uniform_ , Pidge thought to herself, _it does look a lot like the one's Sun and his crew wear._

No, that wasn't it, while her attire may have contributed to her odd sense of familiarity, but it wasn't the cause.

 _Maybe it's her face,_ the young Paladin continued to ponder _yeah…...yeah that's it, her face!_ Something about this strange woman's face was defiantly familiar more so then the simple fact that she was a Lincar.

"This is Vel, she'll be your escort from now on." The Duchess answered, "She's one of my most trusted officers and an exemplary Shipmaster."

"Howdy," Vel said as unceremoniously as physically possible. "now then what was that about Lord Riding boots not sending help?"

"He said he couldn't risk sending the few ships he had nearby on a suicide mission," Pidge answered, surprised by the sudden ire in Vel's voice.

"That's just another bloody excuse to hang Sun out to dry."

"That's enough Captain. I'm sure Lord Morgan has his reasons for not sending help, besides we're not here to criticize the local government, we're here to help Miss Holt and right now that means listening patiently willy informs us as to what happened, do I make myself clear?"

"Yeah, I got it," Vel replied begrudgingly.

"Good, now then, where were we?" Amy asked, turning to face her young companion, a comforting smile plastered across her face.

"Well," Pidge said continuing her tail. "after Lord Morgan made it clear he wasn't going to be sending any back up for Sun I realized one of the reasons he was so reluctant was because Sun never actually told anyone where he was going."

 _Of course, he didn't, because God forbid someone else eve risk their life for once._ Amy thought to herself as Pidge continued her story, _I swear to God the next time I see him I'm gonna beat the heroic out 'em._

"That's amazing," Vel said snapping Duchess Merlin back to reality.

"I'm sorry, what was that?" Amy asked, having been too distracted by her own internal monologue to process the end of Pidge's tail.

"I was just saying how amazing it is that Miss Holt was able to hack into these sentries to find out where they were supposed to take their prisoner," Vel said, in a not so subtle attempt to inform her superior of what exactly she'd missed.

"Wait, you managed to hack into a Galra sentry and managed to find out where they took Commander Shrike?"

"Yeah, it was actually pretty easy. The only part I really had any trouble with was finding a sentry that actually worked. Eventually, I just gave up and decided to try and recover whatever intel I could find from these broken parts. From there finding their rondeaus point pretty easy. I guess recently encoded information isn't as encrypted because it only took me a few minutes to hack in. After that, I decided to see what other intel I could recover, which eventually lead to this." She said motioning to the massive collection of parts dispersed throughout the chamber.

From there an awkward silence fell over the trio as Amy and Vel began to exchange brief worried glances before quickly shifting their gaze back to the young Paladin before them. This continued for a few moments until finally, Pidge decided she'd had enough.

"Okay!" She yelled, interrupting the other two women mid glance. "What the quiznak is going on? Why aren't you happy? Didn't you hear me, I know where Sun is, now we can actually send help…"

"I'm afraid that's not possible," Amy said, every hint of cheer or hope absent from her voice.

"What do you mean it's not possible!" Pidge screamed, her face twisted into an expression of pure hatred. "You're his friend, how can you just abandon him like this?!"

"I'm not abandoning anybody, but Sun made it clear in his message that he didn't want anyone to go after him, especially not you…"

"So, send someone else! It doesn't matter who goes, what matters is that we actually send help"

"We are not doing anything, you are going to another system while I come with a plan, a plan which unfortunately does not involve ordering my soldiers to commit suicide by sending them head first into a Galra trap!"

"But he's your friend?!"

"And so are you, and that why I'm doing this. Think about it, do you think it was a coincidence that those coordinates were so easy to find?! Or that the Galra would entrust such valuable information to some random soldier, especially one who broke so easily?! They wanted us to find those coordinates because they want you to go flying right into their trap! A trap that was meant to catch a mythical weapon powerful enough to destroy entire warships! A trap that will obliterate any vessel that tries to rescue Sun or Commander Shrike! A trap that Sun didn't want either of us wondering into! That's why he went alone! That's why he didn't tell anyone where he was going! And that's why you're staying right where you are! Because that's what Sun would want!"

"Well then screw what he wants! I don't care if he's trying to be all heroic! I don't care if he doesn't want to put anyone else in danger! He's our friend and I'm not just going to sit around while he dies! I was fine with continuing on with my mission because I thought you were going to help him, but if you're not going to do anything to rescue YOUR friend, I will!"

"And how exactly do you plan on doing that young lady?!"

"I'll figure it out!"

"Well you better figure out how to build a warship because there is no way in hell I'm letting you off this station in aboard any Lincar vessel except Vel's and there is no way in hell the _Nova_ is going anywhere near Galra space!"

"You can't do that!"  
"Actually I can, so unless you want to stay on this damn station forever, you're going to do what's best for you! What Sun would want you to do! And that is to stay as far away from Galra space as possible." The Duchess Screamed, her harsh words reverberating off the bulkhead as Pidge bolted from the chamber racing down the hall in a desperate attempt to escape the woman she thought was her friend.

"Should I go after her?" Vel asked as she watched the Young Paladin disappear down the hall, a slight hint of disproval hidden in her otherwise calm voice.

"No, there's no way she can get off this station. Besides, we should give her some space to calm down. Sooner or later she'll realize this is what's best."

"Best for her, or best for you?" She mumbled so that only she could hear.

"What was that Captain?" Merlin asked skeptically.

"Nothing ma'am, nothing at all."

…

"Are you serious?" Sun screamed, his words echoing off the walls as his face twisted into a look of absolute disdain. "Why would I ever want to become one of Zarkon's puppets?"

"Because," the Druid replied, as calm as ever. "you're different than the rest of your pathetic race."

"Yeah, and what makes you so sure?"

"Because I know who you are…"

"Stop saying that!" Sun roared, desperately trying to reach out and strike his captor. "Just because you heard a few stories doesn't mean you suddenly know who the hell I am!"

"Believe me, Sun. I know far more about you than you could possibly imagine." She replied, her tone still as cold and distant as it ever was. Almost as if she was completely ignorant of Sun's rage.

"Yeah, and why's that?"

"I know you were born in the dark. I know that you were abandoned in ash and smoke. I know that you had to fight for every tick you managed to survive."

"So what?! Any idiot can have a shitty past, it doesn't make me special!" Sun shouted in response, the anger in his voice growing with every syllable that blasted its way his lip.

"Oh, but it does, because you didn't just survive Sun, you rose up, you forged yourself into a warrior, you endured every test the Universe put before and it made you strong. And in the end, that's all that matters, Strength. That is Galra way."

"If you honestly believe that, then you're even more deranged than I thought."

"You can mock me all you want, but deep down you know I'm right. You've always known, every time you look at those pathetic nobles that run your worthless civilization. You know that they don't deserve their power, their respect. They didn't fight for it, they didn't earn it. It was given to them by the weak, because that's what happens when you allow the weak to do they want. They hoard their wealth, they create their rules, all to keep the strong from raising up and taking what's truly theirs."

"And what is theirs?"

"Everything!" The druid replied, her voice filled with frenzied enthusiasm. "Because that is the way the Universe was meant to work. The strong take what they need and the weak survive off their scraps. That is the Galra way and that is why we are the true masters of the Universe."

"And what makes you think I'd ever join your little cult?" Sun asked, his tone and expression as defiant as ever.

"Because, when someone offered me the same chance I took it in a heartbeat. And whether you want to admit it or not, we are more alike than you could possibly imagine…"

"We are nothing alike!" Sun growled, his face twisted into a snarl of pure hate.

"Oh really, and what makes you so sure?"

"Because I'm not a monster like you!"

"That's where you're wrong." She replied as she flew across the room, her menacing yellow mere inches from her captive. "you are a monster, like me. And do you want to know why? Because I learned a long time that the word 'monster' is just a tool used by the weak to ostracize anyone who's willing to do what needs to be a done. A weapon they can use to strike down and discredit anyone brave enough to try and make thing better."

"You're insane."

"Am I? Just look at you, during the war you understood what needed to be done, and you did it. Every move you made, every ship you destroyed, every life you took, Galra or otherwise, served a purpose. To achieve victory no matter the cost, and that's exactly what you did. And look what it got you. The instant the war was over and their hides were safe, those worthless cowards, the same ones who you sent you to die, made you a pariah, just because you were willing to do whatever it took to achieve victory. Just like me."

"If you're going to lie to my face you might as well make it consistent," Sun replied, glaring daggers at the women floating before him. "If all you Galra freaks are so wrapped up in this strength crap then why the hell would you ever be a pariah?"

"Because…I'm not a Galra." She replied lowering her hood to reveal features Sun couldn't recognize. Features he'd only seen in pictures, pictures of a time long passed.

"What…. what are you?" he asked, his voice shaking.

"A relic, from a dead race. A race that once thought they could ensure the peace and security of the Galaxy by defending those who were too weak to protect themselves. And when that philosophy came back to haunt them, and when strong realized that they shouldn't have to die defending the weak, they crumbled, and they died. Because in the end strength is only ensure stability, that is the truth that Zarkon showed me and that is why I am offering you the same chance offered me all those years ago. Think about it Sun, you have skills, skills that the Empire could use. Skills that could get you far more than a simple ship. Image it, you in command of an entire fleet, a sector under your control. Think of all the good you could do, all the people you could help, all the orphans abandoned in the dark." She finished, her voice barely a whisper.

And with that the small chamber fell silent as the witch waited eagerly for Sun reply, her soulless yellow eyes still fixed upon his own, searching for any indication of the effect her words had on him. Until finally, he spoke.

"You know, when you first started ranting I thought you were insane. But now that I've heard the whole thing I realize…. insane doesn't begin to cover how messed up you are." The young Captain replied, his previously stunned expression morphing into one of stern defiance.

"I don't care what kind of twisted Phycology you use to justify it, no one should be allowed to take whatever they want just because they're stronger than everyone else, and I should know, because I've been on both sides of that set up and I'm not a fan of either one! So, if that's the basis of your Empire's entire screwed up philosophy, you can take your offer and shove it up your…"

Suddenly, the wound on Sun's chest erupted with pain forcing the young officer to violently wail in agony as he tried to thrash about only to be held down by the witch's dark magic.

"If you choose to continue with this insolence," The druid began as she raised her hood, her hands sparking with bolts of purple energy. "then I have no choice but to resort to more, _direct_ methods of obtaining the information I seek."

And with that the witch let out a blooding curdling laugh, her shrill voice reverberating off the walls as her victim continued to thrash about in agony, his screams of anguish over shadowed by his tormentor's horrid laughter.

…

Pidge wiped the tears from her eyes as she stood alone in the station's auxiliary medical bay, her gaze fixed on the row of healing pods lining the bay's back wall. Inside each of the pods was a member of Sun's crew wounded during the desperate struggle to protect their ship from a hoard of Galra borders. The station's garrison had told her that the _Corsair's_ wounded were being treated here instead of in the main bay because of a lack of space, but deep down she couldn't help but feel that the stigma that seemed to surround Sun had something to do with their accommodations. A hunch that seemed to be supported by the fact that the auxiliary bay appeared to be almost completely void of medical personal.

 _I guess that makes sense_ , she thought to herself, _if they don't care enough to save him why should they care enough to save his men?_

Slowly, the young Paladin approached the row pods, searching for a particular pair of faces in the line of wounded souls until eventually, she found them. Situated almost dead center in the line of pods was pair of soldiers Pidge instantly recognized as members of Sun's bridge crew, more specifically Tactile officer Zek and Gunnery Officer Tar, both of whom she'd gotten to know fairly well over the past couple of weeks. So, as she looked upon them, helpless in their pods, she couldn't help but feel an unrelenting rush of sadness and remorse, not only because of their current condition but because of the part her presence played in bringing it about.

A feeling that was amplified every time she dared to shift her gaze away from Zek and towards his battered comrade who was, by far, the most injured of all the bay's occupants.

His entire right arm was gone along with a good portion of his shoulder, some of which had already been replaced with the beginnings of a crude prosthesis, far simpler than the one attached to her friend Shiro. Besides the arm, which was by far the most shocking of his injuries, he had also suffered from a number of lacerations, most of which had been inflicted by hunks of burning shrapnel. These wounds were scattered across the young man's chest, leg and by the looks of it head. At least, that's the only reason Pidge could think of as to why the young officer was nearly bald, his hair having been crudely shaved off during the various medical procedure he'd undergone being placed in the healing pod. And, as if that wasn't bad enough, several of the poor man's teeth appeared to be missing, a fact that was made obvious every time the young officer stirred or sneered in accordance with some unseen dream more than likely brought about by a combination of his injuries and his incarceration in the healing pod.

To put it simply, the man before her appeared to be little more than a broken frame of his formal self, not even conscious enough to recognize his own suffering and, though she knew it was unlikely that he would remain in this state, she still felt responsible for the pain and agony he was and would inevitably experience in the future.

That's why she simply stood there gazing at the wounded man as she contemplated her options.

 _What the hell am I gonna do?_ She thought to herself. _I've got no ship, no friends, my lion doesn't work, and yet somehow, I've got to go on a rescue mission to save an entire battleship._

"Who am I kidding?" she murmured as she pressed her face the glass tube in front of her. "there's no way in hell I can pull this off."

"Peace to the fallen."

Startled by the sudden appearance of this mysterious voice Pidge whirled around to face its owner only to discover the women Amy had introduced her to early, slowly working her way over to the young Paladin.

"Excuse me?" Pidge asked as she skeptically glared at the approaching woman.

"Peace to the fallen." She repeated growing ever closer to the Paladin and by extension the row of pods behind her. "It's a saying from my home planet. Something we say to honor fallen warriors. A prayer that somehow, somewhere, their find the peace they never knew in life. He's gonna be pissed it's gone."

"What are you talking about?" Pidge asked as she stepped aside, allowing the odd woman before her to approach Tar's healing pod.

Upon reaching it, she pressed her finger against the glass, pointing to an area of empty space where the man's forearm would have been had it still existed.

"He had that phase tattooed right there the day he joined the Royal Navy. Said it gave 'em good luck. When asked him why, he said, 'because I bloody said so, that's why.' And now he's probably gonna be pretty damn upset that it's gone. But, if I know him he'll probably be cracking jokes about before he even gets used to the damn thing not being there." Vel exclaimed, a mix of sadness and joy in her eyes as she recalled the pleasant memories from her youth.

"So, you two…. know each other?" Pidge asked sheepishly.

"Of course, I do. He's my brother." Vel replied, her eyes still fixed on her wound relative.

 _That's why she was so familiar!_ Pidge thought to herself as her brain finally noticed the similarities between her and Lieutenant Tar.

They both had the same accent, and now that she was finally getting a good look at the two of them side by side, there was an obvious resemblance between the two. _Wait a minute?_

"Tar never said he had a sister!" she exclaimed, finishing her own train of thought.

"Yeah, that's my big brother for you. He'll walk right up to ya' and talk for vargas about his favorite pub, but unless you ask about it you won't a get a single bloody word about anything that matters."

"Wait a second, why didn't Amy tell me you and Tar were related?"

"Beats me mate, best guess is she was about to before things got…. heated. Speaking of which, how are holding up?"

"I don't know, let's see, one of the only friends I have left just decided, after waking up from a coma, to go barrel-assing head first into trap deep into Galra territory on a suicidal rescue mission to save someone who may or may not have been involved in a plot to kill him. And that's not even mentioning the fact that I am, have been, and probably will be for the foreseeable future, lost in space billions of miles from my mother who, by the way, is the only relative I actually have left. So yeah, I'd say I'm doing pretty damn great!" Pidge yelled, the sarcasm of her statement vastly over shadowed by the sheer rage in her voice.

"And, as if all that wasn't bad enough, one of the only people who I've ever seen actually treat Sun with any respect just left him to die for no GOD DAMN REASON!"  
 _*sigh*_ "You have to understand…"

"No, I really don't! I don't have to understand! And you know why because I am getting really God damn tired of everyone keeping me in the dark because some jackass thought it was a good idea. I hated it when the Garrison did it, I hated it when Allura did it, and I hate it now. So, if you want me to understand, then you better start explaining shit right now!"

"Fine," Vel said as unceremoniously as their first introduction.

"Don't you try to change the sub-wait did you just say fine?" Pidge asked, genuinely surprised by her response.

"I understand that it can be frustrating the way Duchess Merlin handles her problems. She thinks that if she doesn't talk about her problems they can't affect the people she cares about. But, if growing up on a farm has thought me anything it's that avoiding your problems is no way of handling them. So, if you really want, I'll tell you what's really going on."

"You grew up on a farm?" Pidge asked.

"Is that really all you got out of that?"

"No, I'm sorry my brain tends to focus on weird details. Please continue."

"Okay then. Sun not wanting anyone else to get hurt isn't the only reason the Duchess decided not to send help. She's not sending anyone to go help Sun because she can't."

"Why not?"

"Because, she may be in charge of the entire sector but she still has people she has to answer to, not to mention dozens of minor nobles, like Lord Morgan, for example, each one responsible for a portion of her fleet."

"Wait, so you're telling me that your version of middle management is a guy who lives in a castle on planet surround by orbiting death platforms?"

"I honestly have no idea what that means, but if it helps you understand then knock yourself out. Either way, as powerful as she might seem Merlin is still bound by a set of rules and one of those rules is that she's not allowed to waste Kingdom resources for personal matters."

"Who's bright idea was that?"

"About a thousand years ago some bone 'eaded Duke thought it'd be a good idea to take every ship in his sector to go hunt a Weblum he had a personal vendetta against. To make a long story short a bunch of blokes got disintegrated and the whole bloody sector got pillaged by space pirates. So, the queen and her council of yes men decided that from then on if a Duke or Duchess wanted to dispatch a significant part of a sector's fleet they'd need approval from someone further up the food chain. Which normally wouldn't be much of problem, especially since most of those idiots couldn't care less what their underlings do. But in this particular case, she'd have to convince a bunch of petty jerks to let her risk valuable resources just so that she can save some they either couldn't care less about, or just plain hate. And, as much as I respect her diplomatic skills, I doubt even she could pull that off."

"If that's the case then why wouldn't she just tell me that herself?"

"If I had to guess, she was probably trying to avoid having to explain to you why they hate Sun so much."

"I thought it had something to do with the fact that he was a commoner?"

"That is part of it, but the main reason is a little more complicated. You see, as big as the Kingdom of Lincar is, it's nothing compared to the sheer size of the Galra empire. Honestly, if he wanted to Zarkon could quite literally bury us in ships and sentries, but he doesn't and you know why? Because every time he tries we destroy so much of his shit that he and his goons decide it ain't worth the effort. And to help us accomplish this goal, we created a special group of ships called the Raider Corpse. You see, whenever our war with the Galra heats back up, it's the Raiders' job to go deep into the heart of Galra territory and wreak havoc their infrastructure. Cargo ships, supply station, mining operations, repair anything that might help to fuel the Galra war machine, it's their job to blow it up. Unfortunately, survival isn't exactly placed very high on their list of priorities meaning Raider barely a year. That is until Sun took a crack at it. From the moment, he took command of his first ship, a beat up old destroyer call the _Onager_ , everyone knew there was something different about him. On his first raid, he and his crew managed to destroy seven Galra supply ships before they could even call for help, and from then on, he only got better. To this day Sun and his crew still record for not only the most kills but also the most missions without a single causality."

"I don't understand," Pidge said perplexed. "It sounds to me like Sun was one of the biggest reasons you didn't lose that war. Why would that make him some kind of out cast?"

"Because, like I said Sun was an exceptional Raider, unfortunately being a Raider isn't exactly what most people would call, noble. You see, our job was to destroy Galra infrastructure, and unfortunately, that didn't always mean killing Galra soldiers."

"Wait, are you telling me that you guys…. that Sun…."

"Exactly, so while his actions may have been one of the deciding factors during the war, many people especially the nobles believe that what he did was unforgivable and that he himself, is better than the Galra monsters we fight."

"But...but, it's not his fault they were the one who put him in that situation. Besides if it wasn't for what he did who knows how many people the Galra would have killed." Pidge said in a desperate attempt to defend her friend not only to Vel, but to herself.

"And I agree with you, as does Duchess Merlin. She understands that as horrid as it may be, what Sun and his men did was necessary for the survival of the Kingdom, she also understands that just because Sun did bad doesn't make him a bad man. Unfortunately, her peers found it easier to stomach the idea that a brutish thug from some backwater hell whole took his job too far, then they did the possibility that they forced a good man to do horrible things for the greater good. So, that's the story they decided to tell. The one made the only man who brought any hope to thousands of men condemned to die in the Raider Corpse, look like some kind of monster."

"Why…...why are you telling me this?" Pidge asked, her stern resolution shaken by the emotional rollercoaster she'd just been subjected to. She couldn't believe that Sun, her friend, the one who had protected her as if she was his own flesh and blood, could be responsible for deaths of innocent people. And yet, another part of her understood. Understood that sometimes good men are forced to do bad things. That sometimes you had to do, what you had to do to save the people you cared about.

"Like I said, I grew up on a farm, and on the farm, I learned that avoiding your problems never solved a bloody thing. So, the way I see it, I got two options. One, I can try and stop you from runnin' off to rescue Sun, a course of action which, based on our brief interactions so far, I wouldn't put much faith in. Or two, I can help you rescue the bloody fool before he gets himself killed. An option which I like considerably better the first one. But, I sure as hell ain't gonna put in all the effort to help ya' give Amy the slip if you're the kind of person who's gonna turn your back on your mates the second you learn they've got a few skeletons in their closet. So, tell me, after everything you've heard, after all, he's did, are you still all fired up about rescuing Sun, or are you just gonna do what the Duchess wants to do and continue on with your little friend making trip?"

For several moments, the young Paladin stood there in silence, contemplating the various revelation that had been reviled to her in the past few minutes. Weighing both of her options. Wondering which path, she should choose until finally…she answered.


End file.
